Absolution
by MagicSwede1965
Summary: Christian's emotional war continues while the country prepares to crown a new queen. Conclusion of 'Vindication'.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N:** _The continuation/conclusion of "Vindication". An aside: Christian's native language,_ jordiska, _is meant to be an offshoot of Swedish, much as American English deviates from British English. Thus, I've taken liberties with the Swedish language to reflect that_ jordiska, _while derived from and very similar to the parent tongue, is a language in its own right. (Just in case I get any linguists, or native Swedish speakers!) The story is still in progress as of the original post date, so bear with me and you'll get the rest soon… Once again, many, many thanks to Harry2, PDXWiz, jtbwriter and BishopT for all your wonderful and welcome reviews and comments.  
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§ § § -- June 29, 2001

This time there was no press conference: Prince Carl Johan had the dreadful task of informing the media that the king had died, and the announcement immediately appeared on television broadcasts, interrupting programs the world over. Arnulf lay in state in the castle entry for the next two days after his death, while countless citizens of Lilla Jordsö made their way to the castle to pay their respects. The hallway accesses to the royal family's living quarters were carefully sealed off, and the Enstads sequestered themselves completely out of view while military guards handled the vigil and saw to it that the procession of mourners paid their respects in a quiet, orderly manner and didn't try to bother the grieving family. A heavy emotional pall overhung every move anyone made.

In those first horrible hours after learning of Arnulf's death, Leslie had spent a good hour or more just holding Christian, enduring his spasms of grief and guilt, now and then reminding him that she loved him deeply, no matter what. Before the short northern summer night had faded completely, Gerhard, Liselotta, Christian and Leslie had packed up and joined the rest of the family at the castle, barricading themselves in unison with them. Just before leaving, Leslie had called Roarke on Fantasy Island and let him know that Arnulf had died and they would have to remain for the funeral at the very least. Gerhard had gently suggested she tell him that they were likely to be incommunicado for a few days, and she had duly informed Roarke, who had understood completely.

Today, June 29, was the day of the funeral. Christian and Leslie, who had taken over Christian's old bedroom at the castle, lay limply in the bed, finally fitfully asleep in the sheer dark. The bedroom was located in the castle's interior and had no windows, so that even in broad daylight there was no sense of time. Christian, racked with guilt, had been refusing to see anyone else, and on the few occasions family members came around trying to connect with him and Leslie, she had to tell them he wasn't able just yet.

At the moment Christian was in the depths of a nightmare, one of several he'd had since Arnulf's death. His endless nervous twitching brought Leslie from her uneasy doze, and she lay listening in the utter blackness, dreading the end of the dream. She made no attempt to awaken him: she had tried this before, only to find that it was impossible to get him out of the dream so he could find some relief. He would eventually come out of it on his own, but it would be a violent end; and she braced herself, tears already trickling down her cheeks. His torment was almost as hard on her as on him.

Shortly he began mumbling in his sleep; she heard him shifting restlessly under the sheets, felt the mattress giving with his movements, but couldn't see him. She wasn't sure she wanted to; she had turned on the bedside lamp the one time she'd tried and failed to pull him out of the dream, and the self-loathing on his face had nearly made her ill. She fully intended to stick it out with him, but she wished he would make some attempt to talk out his debilitating grief, to work through it, instead of letting himself wallow in it. He seemed to believe he deserved the torment he was enduring.

Now he was calling out, speaking in _jordiska_ in pleading tones. She understood only the _"nej, nej, plissa!"_ he constantly repeated: "no, no, please!" Oddly, she had guessed the final word herself; at one point, when Christian was relatively calm, he had told her that Swedish had no word for _please_, and _jordiska_-speakers had compensated for this by borrowing and adapting the English word. It was pronounced very similarly and was easy to recognize.

Leslie screwed her eyes shut and waited, trying to withstand the emotion rolling off Christian in waves that seemed nearly tangible. Her head ached dully, as it had been doing since Arnulf's death due to lack of sleep, and her heart felt shattered. Christian was crying out plaintively in his sleep and she started to cry outright; his pleading cut right through her. She could no longer stand it and reached out, just as he abruptly began thrashing in the bed as though fighting physical constraints. Leslie reached over and turned on the lamp, hissed a terrified curse, and lunged at him: he was dangerously close to falling off the bed.

"_Christian, stop it!!"_ she screamed at the top of her lungs.

"_Jag slådde honom!"_ Christian shrieked and came back to consciousness with a convulsive jerk that actually threw him into a sitting position. He sat there with a wild, huge-eyed look, panting with rapid shallow breaths. "I killed him," he said aloud.

"No," Leslie said, her voice hoarse. How many times had he said that, and how many times had she contradicted him? She'd long since learned that _"jag slådde honom"_ meant "I killed him", from sheer repetition; it was always the last thing he said before waking up.

"Yes," Christian said flatly.

"No," Leslie repeated, drained. She no longer had the energy to go on like this and turned away, stumbling out of the bed and across the room to the rather lavishly appointed bathroom that adjoined the bedroom. Once inside, without warning, she felt a surge of nausea so strong there was no battling it, and in seconds she was throwing up what felt like the last week's worth of meals. Christian's emotional trauma was making her sick, she realized, between abdominal spasms that produced enough cranial pressure to convince her that her head was going to explode.

It was a torturous ten minutes before she was certain her stomach had ejected everything it possibly could, and she gingerly rinsed out her mouth and buried her face in a towel. She was at the end of her rope; she just didn't know what else to do. Leslie dropped the towel on the edge of the sink and stepped slowly and carefully out of the bathroom, breathing deeply, her head hanging and her arms wrapped around her stomach. Her abdomen felt sore from the sheer violence with which she had vomited.

A frenetic and persistent banging on one of the doors made both Christian and Leslie start violently and stare. She glanced at him, but he made no move to disentangle himself from the rumpled bedcovers; so she tottered to the door and pulled it open, staring hopelessly at their visitors—Carl Johan, Gerhard and Anna-Kristina.

"_Herregud,_ Leslie, you look like hell!" Carl Johan said, shocked.

"Where's Uncle Christian?" Gerhard asked urgently.

"He's…" Leslie began, but couldn't seem to finish. She made a vague gesture behind her and turned away, falling into a chair at last and bending over double, inhaling and exhaling as if to consume all the oxygen in the room.

Carl Johan and Gerhard looked at each other and came inside, taking in their surroundings. Christian looked to be off in another world altogether, staring blankly into space and sitting utterly still in the same position in which he'd awakened. Behind them Anna-Kristina edged into the room, herself looking pinched from grief, and made a sudden face. "Someone was sick in here," she exclaimed.

"Me," croaked Leslie, lifting her head to stare at her. Anna-Kristina looked horrified, kneeling beside her chair.

"Aunt Leslie, you look…you do look like hell, just as Uncle Carl Johan said," she said softly, her expressive blue eyes filling with tears. "What happened to you?"

"What's wrong with Christian?" Carl Johan put in urgently.

Leslie tried to straighten in the chair. "He thinks he killed Arnulf," she said, watching with a curious detachment as their faces filled with astonishment. "He refuses to listen to me when I tell him he didn't."

"How could he have killed Arnulf?" demanded Carl Johan impatiently.

Before Leslie could reply, Christian said tonelessly from the bed, "I didn't care if he lived or died. I hated him for years. This is the price I pay now…"

"I can't do any more for him," Leslie wailed, breaking down all at once. "Please, help me…I can't get through to him, and it's killing me!" Anna-Kristina immediately began to cry alongside Leslie, but managed to find enough inner strength to reach out and hug her aunt, trying to soothe her as best she could.

"Did you hear that, Christian?" Carl Johan snapped at his brother. "You may be wrong about killing Arnulf, but if you go on like this, you'll definitely kill your wife. What the hell is the matter with you? It's not like you to give in to such hysteria. Snap out of it, you fool, and pull yourself together! No one is responsible for Arnulf's death!" They all looked at Christian, including Leslie with the last of her hope gleaming in her eyes—but he only shook his head and turned away.

Carl Johan cursed. "Fine," he said with disgust. "Maybe if you're left to yourself for a while, you'll come to your senses. But Leslie comes with us. Anna-Kristina, get her some fresh clothing, and Gerhard, find Christian's mobile phone. I think we'd better put through a call to Mr. Roarke and see if he has any advice."

A few minutes later Carl Johan and Anna-Kristina lent support to Leslie, with Gerhard behind them turning on Christian's cellular phone and checking the preprogrammed numbers. "Is your father's number here, Aunt Leslie?" he asked her.

"I don't know," Leslie mumbled, trying to stand fully upright and wincing. "Oh God. I feel about two thousand years old. What are we going to do about Christian?"

"Nothing right now," Carl Johan said firmly. "He seems determined to take blame where there's none to take, and all we can do is give him room. You were ill?"

"I threw up," Leslie admitted, nodding. "I've never been that sick, not with that much force. My stomach hurts…I can't even stand up straight. And the funeral…"

"That's not till this afternoon," Gerhard said. "We have about six hours before we have to leave here for the procession. That's far more than enough time for you to have a good hot shower and relax. _Far,_ maybe we'd better get the castle doctor to look at her."

Anna-Kristina nodded agreement with her cousin. "Yes, I'll go to get him, then. I've never seen Uncle Christian like that. He cried, like any of us, when Grandmamma died, and he was very calm when Grandpappa died…what does he mean when he says he killed Pappa? I don't understand that."

"It goes back to all the years your father and grandfather tried to control the direction of his life, Anna-Kristina," Leslie explained in a tired, trembling voice. "He resented them both all that time, and when we saw your father the day before he died, on the way there Christian admitted to being very angry with him—so much so that the possibility of his death didn't seem to touch him. But that lack of feeling left him with a horrible sense of guilt, and that's what's eating him alive now. I wish he…" She closed her eyes, and tears leaked out from under the lids. "Sometimes I don't think he sees me anymore."

"Sooner or later he'll start thinking beyond his own madness," Carl Johan said. "He's too grounded not to. Try to calm down, Leslie, and think about yourself. You're in nearly as bad shape as Christian is, and if you don't concentrate on yourself for a while, you won't be able to help him at all. Both you and Christian will have to be in the funeral procession, no matter how you're feeling. Gerhard's right—you should see the doctor. We have a live-in physician here; our staff of servants is large enough to warrant it, and he treats the family as well. He speaks good English, Leslie, so you can tell him what you need to."

"What's Mr. Roarke's telephone number?" Gerhard asked, still scrolling through the programmed numbers in Christian's cell phone.

"Zero-zero-one," said Anna-Kristina and met Leslie's surprised look with an unexpected little grin. "I made sure I would never forget." They both giggled faintly.

"There must be more to it than that," Gerhard said impatiently.

"Look for a number that ends in those three digits," Leslie suggested. "Christian's phone service is still based from here, so there's probably a country code. We're 261 from this country, according to your telephone book."

"It's not here," Gerhard said. "I'm sorry, but I guess he didn't put it in."

"That's all right. I can make the call myself," Leslie said softly. "Gerhard, how's Liselotta doing?"

Gerhard looked up sharply, then softened and smiled gratefully at her. "Better than I am, to be honest," he said. "She's been my rock through all this. I only wish Uncle Christian could appreciate your efforts as I do hers."

Carl Johan sighed. "Just for now, forget about Christian," he said. "Here, Leslie, this is Amalia's and my room. Feel free to use anything you wish in the bathroom, and take your time about it. Gerhard and I will wait out here, and Anna-Kristina will bring back the doctor, so that he'll be here when you're ready."

Leslie thanked him, accepted her clothing from Anna-Kristina and shut herself in the bathroom, as lavish as the one in Christian's old room. Moving somewhat painfully, she stripped and climbed into the shower. The hot water felt good; it revived her a little, and she managed to wash her hair and indulge in a good sudsy scrubbing with an exotically-scented shower gel. She concentrated on the sensation of the soap on her body and in her hair, carefully blanking out her mind. She needed to think clearly enough to talk with the doctor; if she thought about Christian she'd cave in to despair.

When Leslie finally emerged from the shower and dried herself off, she found that Anna-Kristina had chosen jeans and a T-shirt for her to wear. She dressed with some care, trying to accommodate her irritable stomach. At last she hesitantly stepped out of the bathroom, immediately catching the attention of Carl Johan, Amalia, Gerhard, Liselotta, Anna-Kristina and a somewhat portly, balding older man she had never met. Carl Johan spoke up, "Leslie, this is Dr. Salomonsson. You can trust him as you would your doctor at home."

While the others waited quietly, watching in concern, the doctor examined Leslie, asked a few questions, and then took a blood sample, to her surprise. Unsure as to what his purpose was, she settled into a chair, absently rubbing her sore stomach while Dr. Salomonsson appropriated the bathroom to process the sample.

When he came out, he said, "Your illness is caused by emotions, Princess Leslie: you are not pregnant." _Oh,_ Leslie thought detachedly, _that's why the sample. Not that I needed to hear him say it, I already knew._ "You should be very careful with your stomach after that vomiting episode. Eat lightly and don't overtax it." He glanced at the others, then added kindly, "I believe it's best that you do not see your husband until the funeral. I would suggest not for at least a day or two, but Prince Carl Johan tells me you must both make appearances. When you see him there, do not try to make him speak, simply let him be. If he responds to you in any way, that is fine; if he does not, then leave him to himself. Do you understand? This is not something you can do for Prince Christian. He must find his own way."

"I understand," Leslie said softly, though it hurt to accede to this.

"Good," said the doctor. To Carl Johan he said, "Your Highness, the princess is best off with the family. It is my opinion that Her Majesty would benefit from seeing her."

"We'll arrange it, then," said Carl Johan. "Thank you, doctor." Dr. Salomonsson gave a quick shallow bow, meant for the group collectively, and departed.

Leslie looked up. "How is Queen Kristina doing?"

"Mamma's better," Anna-Kristina said. "Very sad, of course, but she is calm. I think Dr. Salomonsson's right—she would be happy to see you. Just say when."

"Anytime, I guess," Leslie murmured, shrugging. In the wake of her separation from Christian, she had gone numb; she supposed Roarke would diagnose her state of mind as emotional overload. That was all right with her; she was tired of feeling. She was tired, period. "I wish I could sleep," she said without thinking, her right hand moving of its own accord to rub her wedding and engagement rings. Only then did she realize she didn't have them on. "My rings…I need my rings…"

"Leslie, you'll be fine without them for a while," Carl Johan said kindly. "Don't worry about those just now, all right?"

Leslie could feel the first tendrils of creeping hysteria and tried to fight them off. "Please," she said helplessly. "Just the rings…please?"

Carl Johan looked at Amalia, who shook her head at him. "It's a small thing," she said in good English, though with a fairly heavy accent. "Gerhard, why don't you go and get your aunt's rings for her. I think it will help her."

Gerhard rose. "Where are they, Aunt Leslie?" he asked.

"On the bedside table," Leslie said. "I left the lamp on when you came and took me out…they should still be there." Gerhard nodded and left the room.

Anna-Kristina looked worriedly at Leslie, then at Carl Johan, and fretted, "What can we do about Uncle Christian? I know you said just to leave him, but I don't think that will help him either. We should have sent Dr. Salomonsson to him."

"Christian needs a psychiatrist, not a physician," Carl Johan grunted. "And at the moment, Leslie doesn't need to hear about Christian at all." He slumped wearily in his chair. "As if all this weren't enough, we have to prepare Gabriella for her coronation ceremony, and you know the law: no longer than two weeks can pass between the death of one monarch and the coronation of the next. I hope Mr. Roarke can spare you that long, Leslie, for you and Christian must be here for that as well."

"Father will understand," Leslie said quietly, still feeling strangely detached. "He always does. He knows the protocol…sometimes he knows things I don't, and I'm the one who married into royalty." At their soft chuckles, the ghost of a smile flitted across her face, and then she withdrew into herself. She didn't think she could face anyone, not even her well-meaning relatives.

"Has she spoken with Mr. Roarke?" Amalia asked.

"No, we haven't called him yet," Anna-Kristina said. "Gerhard has Uncle Christian's mobile with him, but the number isn't already in the phone."

Amalia nodded. "Then I think perhaps you should handle that, Carl Johan, and in the meantime Leslie should sleep if possible. I can see the signs of sleeplessness."

Leslie spoke in a monotone. "Christian's had so many nightmares, I'm amazed either of us has slept. He dreams, and I lie there witnessing them."

"All the more reason for you to sleep now, when you're away from him," Amalia said firmly. "There is a quiet room just across the hall from here, and you're going there to have a nap. I think it's the very best thing for you."

Gerhard returned then with Leslie's rings and handed them to her. "Did you have any problems with Christian?" Carl Johan asked.

"No…as a matter of fact, Uncle Christian wasn't even in the room," Gerhard said. "He must have gone off somewhere." Leslie, sliding the rings onto her finger, looked up.

"Is anyone going to look for him?" she asked. "You might find him upstairs, in one of the old servants' rooms."

The others looked at each other in amazement. "How do you know that?" Carl Johan asked. "He could be anywhere."

"Try there first," Leslie said and smiled faintly, then suddenly yawned. "Oh dear, Amalia's right. I really need to get some sleep."

Amalia got up and escorted her out; when they had left, Carl Johan held out his hand. "Give me Christian's mobile, Gerhard. I'd better explain things to Mr. Roarke. At the very least, he should know what's happening; if we're lucky, he might have some answers."


	2. Chapter 2

§ § § -- June 29, 2001 – Fantasy Island

Where it was midmorning on Lilla Jordsö, it was late evening on Fantasy Island. A little past nine, the phone rang in the study, and Roarke answered immediately; he had been clearing out more of the never-ending paperwork and was nearly caught up. "Yes, may I help you?" he asked.

To his surprise, he heard, "Mr. Roarke, this is Prince Carl Johan—Christian's older brother—calling from Lilla Jordsö. You are, of course, aware of King Arnulf's passing two days ago; the funeral is scheduled for late this afternoon. However…we have had some serious problems, and I hoped perhaps you could offer some advice."

"Are Christian and Leslie all right?" Roarke asked, his first concern naturally for his daughter and her husband.

"No, I don't think so," Carl Johan said, touching off a frisson of alarm in Roarke. "I am not sure what Leslie may have told you; but Christian has been filled with guilt over his feelings toward Arnulf, and admitted to her, my sister and me that he was ambivalent about the possibility of Arnulf's dying. Now that it has actually taken place, that very ambivalence is driving him mad. It has become so all-consuming in fact that he's gone so far as to shut out Leslie. Our only hope just now is that this is temporary. In the meantime, when we finally came to pull them out of seclusion once and for all, we discovered the true severity of Christian's emotional condition. It made Leslie physically ill, and we felt the best thing to do was to separate them for a time. At the moment Leslie is napping, and we are looking for Christian…he seems to have…" Carl Johan sighed heavily. "This is surreal, Mr. Roarke."

"I can certainly imagine," Roarke said. "Before I go further, please accept my deepest sympathies and regrets at King Arnulf's passing." He paused long enough for Carl Johan's acknowledgement, then said, "Please tell me exactly what state Christian and Leslie were in when you found them." As Carl Johan related what he, Anna-Kristina and Gerhard had walked in on, Roarke closed his eyes and suppressed a sigh.

"We brought the castle doctor in to check Leslie," Carl Johan said, "and he advised that her emotions had been making her ill. Yet it's Christian who has…gone around the bend, if I have the idiom right. I am afraid I don't quite understand."

"Leslie has a strong tendency towards empathy," Roarke said. "She has been known to take personally the emotions of some of our guests, if they have had experiences similar to events of her own past; but it is most notable when she is around those she loves. Because Christian is the one who is affected, she would take on as much of his trauma as she could—far too much for her. You did right, Your Highness, to separate her from Christian for a time. She must regain some measure of equilibrium, or she can never provide the strength and emotional sustenance that Christian needs."

Carl Johan exhaled audibly on the other end. "Then we _have_ done the right thing. I'm very relieved to know that. As I said, at the moment she is asleep; our concern now is for Christian. My son went back to fetch her wedding rings for her, and discovered that Christian was no longer in the room he and Leslie have been using. Leslie made a suggestion as to where he may have gone, but quite frankly, this castle has more hiding places than a carnival funhouse. Do you have any suggestions, perhaps?"

"When you do find him," Roarke said, "I think you are better off keeping him separated from Leslie for some time yet, just so that she can get the sleep she needs. You should certainly have your doctor see him; if Christian is in the state I suspect he is in, he may need a sedative of his own. Without having seen him, I can't suggest anything more."

"I understand," said Carl Johan. "We may call again, Mr. Roarke, if Christian's condition persists. For now we must prepare for the funeral…"

"Of course," Roarke said. "By all means, yes, keep me informed. As a matter of fact, contact me again as soon as you can after the funeral."

"We will do that, then," said Carl Johan. "My deepest thanks, Mr. Roarke."

Roarke acknowledged this quietly and then hung up, half falling back in his chair and staring at the ceiling. In truth, he wasn't surprised that this had happened; Christian had been battling guilt from the moment he'd learned of Arnulf's initial heart attack, and Leslie had absorbed his emotions to the point that they had overwhelmed her. He wished, futilely he knew, that Leslie could attain some level of detachment; but at the same time, those empathetic abilities were part of what made her so good at her job. And when all was said and done, that very empathy would be what helped Christian recover from all this—if, indeed, he would let himself be helped. Roarke wondered what sort of state he and Leslie would be in when they finally returned from Lilla Jordsö, and had to hope that perhaps the celebration of his niece Gabriella's crowning would give him some relief.

§ § § -- Lilla Jordsö

Christian's blind wandering had taken him as far down as it was possible to go without digging. Some vestige of the country's—and the castle's—Viking origins was hidden here in the damp, moldy depths of the centuries-old foundation. When he blinked in the dimness and really looked around him, he noticed several tiny, cramped rooms with slits at the tops of their far walls serving as windows. Half-rotted wooden doors did nothing to deter the comings and goings of the assorted vermin that lived here. _I must be in hell,_ he thought blankly. _Just about where I belong after what I did._ A rat ran over his bare foot and he yanked it reflexively off the ground. So he had company, he realized, gazing detachedly around him, amazed but only vaguely repelled by the sheer numbers of living creatures that scuttled back and forth across the dank corridor in which he stood. Mentally Christian shrugged: he'd come to the right place to wrestle with his guilt.

Morbidly curious, he ventured into one of the tiny rooms—unquestionably a cell in an ancient dungeon—and peered around, sidestepping rat nests and ducking spider webs, poking ahead with one foot prior to every step. He half expected to find bones lying in the corner…maybe a skull as well. But this particular cell was empty of human remains, and he thought just for a second that maybe someone would find his own skeleton here one day, perhaps one of Arnulf's great-great-grandchildren…

At that point the sunshine that had been filtering in faded, drawing his attention to the slit near the ceiling that passed for a window. The sliver of sky visible through it had turned gray. Some nearly-unnoticed corner of his tormented mind entertained the possibility of a storm, and his interest was piqued, however faintly. Might rain have blown in on those long-ago prisoners through those crude air vents up there? _What a miserable existence._ Christian ventured a little closer to the back wall and abruptly stepped on something warm and wriggling, which let out a chorus of tiny squeals. With a shouted curse he leaped away and backpedaled at speed, colliding hard with the stone wall. When his eyes finally adjusted from staring at the light through the tiny window, he realized he'd managed to plant his foot squarely on a rat's nest full of young. Again he cursed, half awed, half repelled. But before he could react any further, out shot mama rat, streaking at him from some hole in the wall. It was too much for Christian, and he careened back into the hallway, expelling curses in both English and _jordiska_, crashing into another wall and almost falling. Shock and some fear had his heart rate going double time and his breathing fast and shallow. Yes, this was hell, no doubt about it.

"Well," he yelled in _jordiska_ at the ceiling above him, "here I am, Arnulf. I've finally found Hades. Maybe now you can rest in peace, knowing that I've presented myself for whatever punishment I'm going to get." As if in response, the same enraged mother rat came flying at him from the cell he had just abandoned, screeching in fury. But Christian, back in his strange mental miasma, was visited with some fury of his own and reacted accordingly, lashing out at the rat with a vicious kick. He was as surprised as the rat probably was when he connected, sending the animal sailing back into the cell it had emerged from. Since he was here to stay, he thought, he'd show those vermin just who was boss around here. He barely heard his own faintly hysterical laughter, echoing off the stone walls.

‡ ‡ ‡

Carl Johan was pacing his and Amalia's room while Amalia, Anna-Laura and the seven Enstad children, along with the spouses of three of them, watched uneasily. "We have less than an hour before we have to leave for the memorial," he fumed, frustrated and very angry. "Where the hell can he possibly be?"

"We've looked everywhere," Gerhard said with a helpless shrug.

"Did you try the third floor, as Leslie suggested earlier?" Carl Johan demanded.

Anna-Kristina nodded. "We girls went up together and split up to look around in all the empty rooms, but he's not there. Maybe he isn't even in the castle."

Carl Johan cursed, running his hand through his hair. "I expect all my hair will be gray by tomorrow, at this rate. We're going to have to awaken Leslie soon as it is…she's been sleeping all afternoon. I didn't want to disturb her, but things are getting critical. Anna-Kristina, if you and Liselotta will go across the hall and—"

He was interrupted by a knock on the door, and Cecilia, who was closest, reached out and opened it. Two servants stood there, both looking extremely spooked. "Forgive us, Your Highnesses," one said in a quavering voice. "But we feel you should know."

"About what?" asked Gerhard.

"Voices," said the other servant with a solemn nod. "We've heard strange cries from beneath the floors. Laughter and shouting and terrible curses…"

The royal family exchanged glances, and Anna-Laura demanded, "Where did these noises come from, then?"

"Beneath the floors, Your Highness, as I said," the second servant told her.

"Beneath the floors?" Carl Johan echoed. "That makes no sense. Which floors do you speak of? Where precisely did you hear these…these voices?"

The first servant hugged himself, visibly shivering despite the summer warmth. "We heard them in the old larder. One of us went there to retrieve items for dinner this evening, and he came back crying out that he heard someone screaming at him from hell."

"Superstitious rot," muttered Rudolf, disgusted.

Margareta frowned. "Maybe not," she said. "What did this voice sound like?"

"Crazed," the first servant said, eyes wide and solemn. "Full-on lunatic."

"That's not what we mean," Gerhard said, a little impatient. "What we need to know is, was it male or female?"

"It was—" The second servant clammed up at a sound from behind, and he and his companion both turned to stare: Leslie had just closed the door to the room across the hall, looking only slightly better than she had when she'd gone in. She stopped in the middle of the corridor, uncertain and a bit unnerved at all the eyes on her.

"Am I interrupting something?" she asked timidly.

Carl Johan shook his head. "Come in here, Leslie," he said kindly, and in _jordiska_ he snapped to the servants, "Step aside for Princess Leslie. Now what was this again? Was that voice male or female?"

"Male," the second servant said immediately, watching Leslie edge past him into the room. "Perhaps this castle has been haunted by the ghost of our good King Arnulf…"

Rudolf cursed volubly. _"Far,_ is it really necessary to listen to such foolishness? These are provincial people—we'll never get anything useful out of them. How is it that our servants always seem to be the most ignorant and superstitious people in the country?"

All this had been going on in _jordiska_, and Leslie stared, wondering; her attention shot to Carl Johan when he spoke a bit sharply to his younger son. "I'm sorry, but what's going on?" she asked him. "Have you found Christian yet?"

Anna-Kristina caught her eye and made a few frantic downward fluttering motions with her palms down, then put a finger to her lips, wide-eyed. Bewildered, Leslie subsided, with the feeling that she'd missed more than could be accounted for by her lack of knowledge of _jordiska_. And why the secrecy?

The conversation continued for a few more moments; then Carl Johan dismissed the two servants and turned to Leslie. "They don't understand English, Leslie, but I didn't want to take the chance," he said. "You see, only the family realizes Christian is missing."

"Oh," said Leslie. "So what was that all about, then?"

"Only two superstitious servants, Aunt Leslie," said Rudolf with an apologetic shrug. "They came up here to claim they were hearing voices somewhere in the kitchens."

Leslie went alert. "What sort of voices?"

"Screaming and laughter and…what was that the one said?—'terrible curses'," said Gerhard a bit mockingly. "As if the place were haunted."

"That one fool suggested it was Pappa haunting it," Gabriella spat. "When I am queen, that servant will lose his job for such an insensitive statement."

"Calm down, Briella," Carl Johan said. "You know they don't know any better. In any case, Leslie, it's not our concern."

Leslie protested, "But what if it was Christian?"

Her in-laws all stilled and gaped at her. "You can't be serious," Rudolf finally said. "I mean…screaming and laughter?…"

"Christian's not himself," Leslie said, her eyes beginning to sting with tears. "You know that as well as I do. And nobody can find him, right? I guess he wasn't upstairs or he'd be in here with the rest of you, probably. Please, tell me exactly what they said."

"One of them said the voices were coming from beneath the floors," Carl Johan said gently, obviously seeing her distress and trying to calm her. "The kitchens are on the lowest level of the castle, below the main level. It wouldn't be possible for anything to be heard from beneath those floors."

"Actually," Anna-Laura said suddenly, "it would." Everyone stared at her. "The servants' work quarters are not the lowest level. There is a sub-level below that…I believe that was where the first eight or ten kings maintained dungeons in the Dark Ages. To the best of my knowledge, the accesses to this dungeon were sealed off sometime in the seventeenth century. Christian always had a way of exploring every remote corner in the castle when he was a child. Perhaps he somehow found his way down there."

"There can't possibly be anything down there after more than three hundred years," said Carl Johan. "And if the accesses were sealed off, how could Christian get in?"

"Oh, he'd find a way," Anna-Laura said, nodding knowingly. "He always did. Why should it be any different now that he's grown? We'd better look."

"But we wouldn't know _where_ to look," Gerhard protested. "I think you're the only one who even knew there was a dungeon down there in the first place. How could we know where the access to it is? If Uncle Christian really is down there, we're going to need a lot of help just finding out how he got there, never mind getting him back out."

Anna-Laura smiled faintly. "You forget," she said, "I'm the family historian, amateur or no. Now as I recall it, the old larder is located at the end of the main corridor on the lowest level. I always believed that corridor didn't stretch all the way to the outside wall as it should have. It seems to me that something in there was walled off—quite possibly the access to the dungeon. Or at least one of them."

"I hope there's more than one," Leslie said softly. "If it was walled off, it wouldn't be possible for Christian to break through. He'd have had to find another way."

"I think so too," agreed Anna-Laura. "But that's a good place to start. Who will go?"

Carl Johan sighed. "I'll do it," he said. "Rudolf and Gerhard will come with me."

"I will too," Leslie said.

"No," chorused several voices, startling her. Gerhard went on, "No, Aunt Leslie, you shouldn't go. Dr. Salomonsson said that you shouldn't see Uncle Christian until the funeral, remember?"

"I spoke with Mr. Roarke," added Carl Johan, "and he agreed: he told me we had done the right thing to separate you from Christian for a time. You needed a chance to calm down and get some sleep, and regain a little strength. Frankly, you still don't look normal, and I don't think you should be there whenever we do find Christian. No, you are to remain here with Anna-Laura and the others. Not only do I not want you seeing Christian in whatever state he may be in, but I don't think it's wise for Christian to see you either. I don't know what reaction he may have."

Leslie bit her lip nervously, but there was resolve in her eyes. "I don't care," she said quietly but stubbornly. "I'm going anyway. I want to be sure Christian's all right."

Anna-Kristina gave her uncle a knowing look. "You can't stop her, Uncle Carl Johan," she said wryly. "Mr. Roarke says Aunt Leslie is very stubborn. And I know if I were in love with someone the way she's in love with Uncle Christian, I'd want to be sure he's all right as well. Besides, now that Uncle Christian's been away from her all day, maybe seeing her will make him come to his senses again, even just a little."

Carl Johan regarded her with enormous doubt, but when he looked at Leslie, he could see immediately that Anna-Kristina was right. He shook his head. "Let me go on the record as saying that I don't like this at all. I think it's completely inadvisable. But we're running out of time and we must find Christian…so very well, Leslie, come with us."

"You'd better get some shoes, Leslie," Anna-Laura advised. "I have no doubt that those dungeons are unimaginably filthy. There's no telling what may be down there."

"Rats and snakes and every sort of insect, I'm sure," said Rudolf, eliciting revolted squeals and cries from Arnulf's daughters and Cecilia. At that he gave Leslie a wry, twisted smile. "Do you still want to come, Aunt Leslie?"

"Yes, I do," Leslie said firmly. "You're not going to change my mind."

Rudolf grinned, admiration in his eyes. "Good for you. Well, then, let's go."


	3. Chapter 3

§ § § -- June 29, 2001

They detoured to Christian's old bedroom long enough for Leslie to find a pair of sneakers; then they went down to the first floor, collected flashlights from several different rooms, and then filed out to the great entry hall and all the way to the dining room at the far end. In the corner of the room almost directly opposite from its entrance was a closed door, through which Carl Johan now led his sons and Leslie. This opened onto a flight of stairs that took them down to the kitchens. One or two of the servants working there looked up in amazement and stared as they passed by, until Rudolf made a cutting remark that instantly put them back to work. Leslie decided not to ask for a translation.

In what clearly had to be the main corridor, the foursome hiked all the way to its end, where they met up with a blank stone wall. Carl Johan knocked an experimental fist on some of the rocks, but they sounded quite solid. "If there ever was a dungeon entrance back here," he remarked, "it's well and truly sealed off now."

Leslie eyed an open door at their left that showed only blackness beyond. "Is that the old larder?" she asked.

"Yes," said Gerhard. "It's called that because it was the original food-storage room down here. There's a far more modern one now, but non-perishables are still stored in this one. Come to think of it, I've never been in here. Should we look, _far?"_

"We have nothing to lose by trying," Carl Johan said. He reached around the doorjamb and patted the wall till he found a light switch, which he flipped, and then led his sons and Leslie into the room. It turned out to be quite large, a long rectangular room lined from floor to ceiling with shelves containing all manner of boxes, jars and cans. The room was some thirty feet or so in length, and the only light was at the end near the door; however, they had no trouble seeing that something was very much out of place at the far end.

"What's that?" Rudolf asked, switching on his flashlight and training it down there. Leslie turned hers on and slipped around him, half running in the direction of his beam and playing hers across what proved to be a large, heavy metal shelving unit, shifted out of its usual place against the wall, and quite a collection of food containers sitting in absurdly neat rows on the floor nearby. When she aimed her light at the wall, she gasped loudly.

Carl Johan called, "What's wrong, Leslie?"

"There's a door here!" she exclaimed. "Did you know about this?"

"No," Carl Johan said, astonished, and he and his sons joined her, all four of them shining flashlight beams on the clearly-demarcated door in the wall. A thick, heavy wooden bar leaned against the next shelving unit, and a badly rusted lock had been snapped and now hung forlornly out of the door handle.

As they stood there staring, there was a sudden unmistakable laugh from somewhere below them. Gerhard and Rudolf looked at each other, both breathing the same curse at the same moment. Carl Johan leaned forward; Leslie's hand flew to her mouth.

"Oh my God, that sounds like Christian!" she cried.

"You're right, I'm afraid it does," Carl Johan agreed grimly. "I'm going ahead. Leslie, this time, stay where you are. I have no idea what lies beyond that door."

"Christian is," Leslie whispered, fighting to retain emotional control.

Carl Johan paused long enough to give her an understanding look. "I think you're right, but we don't know what condition he's in now. Please, just wait here with Gerhard and Rudolf. When I have some idea of what's there, I'll let you know."

The younger three waited tensely while he pulled the door open and hesitated just inside, slowly exploring whatever lay beyond with his flashlight beam. "The rest of you, aim your lights here. It's blacker than tar in there."

"Steps," Gerhard said, pointing his beam down. "I think we've found Aunt Anna-Laura's dungeon."

_And Christian's private hell,_ Leslie didn't add. She and the younger princes kept their lights shining down the stairway while Carl Johan gingerly descended, checking out every step with his light before putting his weight on it. It took him several minutes to reach the last tread, from where he played his flashlight in slow circles to see what lay ahead.

"Anything?" Rudolf called down.

Before Carl Johan could reply, they heard a small thud and a squeak, then a vicious, hissed exclamation in _jordiska_, at some distance but close enough to startle them all. _"Det var det som du fortjennar! Hjusa! Dehär är mit helvete, inte dit!"_

"_Jesu i himlen,"_ they heard Carl Johan mutter uneasily.

"It's Christian," Leslie breathed, frightened. "What did he say?"

Gerhard said very softly, "He said, 'That was what you deserve…this is my hell, not yours'. And in between…well, it was a very, very bad swear word, probably the worst one we have. It's not derived from Swedish, just one of our own, but I shouldn't translate it." He gave her a wry smile. "He seems to be extremely angry."

"Oh, you think so?" retorted Rudolf in a sarcastic mutter. "I think he killed something down there. I heard an odd noise before he spoke."

Leslie's gasp was half sob, and she took a step forward; Gerhard promptly restrained her. "Don't, Aunt Leslie. We have to be careful. Let _far_ make it known to Uncle Christian that we're here, at least."

She gave him a frantic look but managed to gain control; Gerhard smiled briefly and then peered down the stairs. Carl Johan had been watching them; now he shook his head at them and said, "I'd better go and see where he is. He sounds…" Cutting himself off, he turned abruptly and stepped off the final tread, then let out a repulsed exclamation. "Don't let Leslie come down here, you two. I've never seen so many vermin."

"My God," Gerhard muttered. "Rats and snakes and every sort of insect, then, Rudolf? I volunteer you as the next one to go down there." Rudolf shot him a sardonic look, and Leslie thought she must be nuts: she was on the edge of telling them not to argue!

"Christian, what are you doing down here?" Carl Johan called out, using English for Leslie's benefit. "Where are you?"

For some reason Leslie was deeply relieved when Christian answered in English, even though his voice was an enraged snarl. "What in hell are _you_ doing here? Get out of here and let me be! I have my reasons!"

"Really, and just what would they be?" Carl Johan retorted.

"As if you didn't know," Christian jeered. "Don't tell me you can't remember what I said on the way to the hospital the other day. I…_aaahh! Jag sade dehär är _mit_ helvete!"_ There was a string of sharp, furious curses and another small thud that made Gerhard and Rudolf wince and prompted Leslie to close her eyes, cover her mouth and wrap one arm around her stomach. _"Du får finna dit eget helvete ock lemna mej med mit!"_

"Damn it, Christian, what are you doing?" yelled Carl Johan, frustrated.

"Oh, only doing my part to rid this place of some freeloaders," Christian replied mockingly, his voice echoing slightly. "It's surprisingly easy to kill a rat. It should be, since I've already killed my own brother."

Rudolf cursed, in tandem with his father. Leslie could endure no more. "Christian, please!" she screamed down the stairs.

"Get her out of here," Christian shouted, apparently at Carl Johan. "If you think you're going to use her to draw me out, you're insane. She shouldn't even be here."

"Neither should you," Leslie cried. "You're going to make yourself sick."

"That's the idea," Christian shot back.

Carl Johan turned and snapped, "Leslie, stop, you're only provoking him! Rudolf, get down here—I'm going to need your help. Gerhard, make certain Leslie stays there."

Rudolf immediately clattered down the steps, asking a question in _jordiska_ on the way. Carl Johan replied, and Gerhard's and Leslie's flashlight beams revealed the two of them moving determinedly forward before disappearing from view. They waited for perhaps five minutes without hearing anything; then Leslie shook her head. "I'm going down."

"No!" Gerhard protested, grabbing her arm.

Frustrated, Leslie shook him off. "Don't try to stop me! I'm telling you now, Gerhard, if you do, I can't predict what I'll do. He's my husband, and I've got to try!" She took the steps as quickly as she dared, hesitating a bare second at the bottom before launching herself onto the filthy floor and marching determinedly in the direction of the wavering flashlight beams. She tried not to look at the floor, training her gaze grimly straight ahead; after a few minutes during which her shoes occasionally crunched on things she preferred not to think about, she reached a dismal little room where Carl Johan and Rudolf stood glaring down at Christian. He sat on the floor in the corner, barefoot and shirtless, his hair and skin covered with whatever filth he'd picked up down here; and his eyes glittered with an enraged light. The three men were carrying on in furious, machine-gun _jordiska_—until Christian happened by chance to glance past his brother and nephew and saw Leslie in the doorway.

"Christian, my love, please," she begged helplessly. "Please, come back with us. We need you. I need you even more."

Christian stared at her for a long interminable minute, and no one moved. Then, as if Carl Johan and Rudolf weren't there at all, Christian pushed himself to his feet and slowly approached her, the light in his eyes softening. He stopped just short of her and regarded her in silence, then smiled unexpectedly—a soft, loving, infinitely sad smile. "My beautiful Leslie Rose," he said, ever so gently. "This isn't the place for you, my darling. They never should have brought you here."

"I insisted on coming," Leslie said softly. "My love, please, for my sake…come back with us. I'm so afraid for you…I…I don't think I know you anymore."

Christian reached out, started to touch her, then drew back. "I shouldn't…I'll make you ill. My darling, you know I have to do this, and you know why."

"No, you don't," Leslie told him. "Tell me something. Do you truly think Arnulf would have wanted you to do this? Think about it, and tell me."

Christian's expression grew a bit perplexed, but he stood silently, seemed to be mulling over her words, though his gaze never left hers. The silence stretched; behind Christian, Carl Johan and Rudolf stood watching intently, though both Christian and Leslie seemed to have forgotten they were there.

Then Christian's features contorted, just for a moment. "I think he's laughing," he said softly, his gaze dropping. "Somewhere, Arnulf is laughing at me. He had the last word on me just by dying. He must have known that I had those miserable thoughts."

"How?" Leslie asked. "He couldn't read your mind, my love."

"Do you remember what he said the other day?" Christian asked, still in that soft, gentle voice. "He said that perhaps I hated him, and if so, he didn't blame me. He must have known, my Rose. When he was facing death and understood at last just what he had done all those years, he said aloud exactly what I felt."

Leslie chose her words deliberately. "Christian, my darling, did you hate him?"

He took a breath to answer, caught himself, fidgeted a moment, then met her gaze with a pleading look. "I did sometimes."

"But not all the time, right?" she prompted.

Again he started to answer and caught himself, going utterly still with some revelation. His eyes slowly widened and he looked at her with wonder. "No…not all the time," he said, as if astonished by this realization.

Leslie nodded, hope rising within her, but well aware she needed to take it slowly. "Right…not all the time. Did you hate him when he set you free from Marina?"

"No," Christian breathed, looking stunned. "Not then."

"And you didn't hate him when we were talking to him at the hospital, did you?" Leslie prodded further.

Christian shook his head a little. "No…I was angry and upset, and I think I was very confused. But he answered all my questions…the ones I asked and the ones I didn't." Again he looked directly at her. "I didn't hate him then either."

"You're grieving, aren't you?" Leslie asked then, matching his earlier gentle tone.

"I…of course," Christian said, bewildered. "That's why I'm here…punishment…"

"Not from Arnulf, my love," Leslie said quietly. "Only from yourself. Tell me again, why are you punishing yourself?"

"I didn't care if he lived or died," said Christian impatiently, his voice rising a bit. Though neither he nor Leslie noticed, concentrated on each other as they were, Carl Johan winced a little and seemed to brace himself; Rudolf tensed, ready to run to Leslie's aid if need be. "You know that, my Rose—I just didn't care."

She nodded a couple of times and replied soothingly, "Yes, my love, I know. But I think that was true only sometimes, too. Christian, think about this. If you truly didn't care whether he lived or died, you wouldn't be grieving now."

Once more Christian started to speak and caught himself before the first word got out. His face showed the thought process churning in his mind; Leslie, Rudolf and Carl Johan watched him, so intently they didn't notice the squeaking of rats in the hallway and the other cells. As they studied Christian, he twitched a little, shifted his weight, fidgeted again. Slowly, hope filtered into his expression, and at last he dared meet Leslie's gaze again. "Yes, you're right. I cried in your arms, didn't I? And I came here, and I…I…I've been grieving…yes, my darling, you're right."

She smiled at him. "Then there you are, my love."

He stood like a statue, still staring at her, for an endless ten seconds; then he blinked, looked around him and flinched. "I don't…what was I thinking, coming here? I can't even remember how I got here…" Wide-eyed with revulsion, he looked around him, turning in a slow circle and taking in his dismal surroundings. "I must have been crazy. This has to be those damned dungeons Anna-Laura told me about when I was seven and she was trying to make me behave…"

"You knew about this place?" Carl Johan blurted in disbelief.

Christian flapped a dismissive hand at him. "I've known about it for years, Carl Johan. You should get Anna-Laura to tell you the story. As for me…" He looked down at himself and made a supremely disgusted noise. "I need a shower in the worst possible way. What in hell have I been doing down here?"

"Killing rats, it seems," remarked Rudolf dryly, pointing at the far wall. Half a dozen small gray bodies lay along the perimeter. Carl Johan recoiled with a startled curse, and Leslie swallowed loudly and turned away. Christian cursed softly in awe at the sight; then he caught her movement, started to reach for her, and drew back again.

"My Rose," he said, "look at me, please?" She turned to him, and he said with a small, wry smile, "Please, my darling, don't misunderstand my actions. I so want to touch you, but if I dare, I think I'll contaminate you. I just wanted you to know."

She grinned. "I understand. Come on, let's get you out of here."

As soon as they came within Gerhard's sight, the prince burst out, "I told her not to go down there—I even tried to stop her—but she just wouldn't listen to me."

"It's all right, Gerhard," Carl Johan said, leading the way up the steps. "I think it was the best thing that could have happened. Somehow I think she brought Christian back to us." He indicated Christian and Leslie, walking side by side; though he took care not to touch her, they exchanged frequent glances and smiles.

Gerhard shook his head. "I expect this is one day that will go down in the family annals for far more than Uncle Arnulf's funeral. How much time do we have?"

"Half an hour, no more," Carl Johan said, checking his watch. "As desperately as you need to clean up, Christian, I hope you can be quick about it."

"I have help," Christian said wickedly, and Leslie burst out laughing. Gerhard and Rudolf smirked, and Carl Johan rolled his eyes.


	4. Chapter 4

§ § § -- June 29, 2001

Leslie changed her clothes and laid out Christian's while he was showering, and was just brushing her hair when he emerged from the bathroom in a cloud of soap-scented steam, faintly trailing his unique cologne. "Aha," she said, "so there really was a human being under all that filth. You must have turned the water black."

"You little tease," Christian said affectionately, removing the brush from her hand and tossing it carelessly aside. "I think there's no fear of contaminating you now, so be quiet and let me put those lips to a better use." He pulled her into his arms and kissed her deeply; in no time at all they were lost.

When he eventually drew back, she whispered dreamily, "Welcome back, my love."

Christian caressed her lower lip with his tongue and whispered back, "You brought me back, you know…and I love you more than ever for it." Once more he kissed her.

They were on the edge of losing track of time and utterly forgetting anything but each other, when a voice yelled from outside the room, "Are you finished yet, Christian? We have perhaps five minutes before we must leave, and the cars are waiting for us already."

Christian pulled back from Leslie with a jerk and blew out his breath. _"Må sanktarna hålla plass till mej."_ He saw her grin and amended, "For us both. It's funny, but I think Arnulf would have understood completely."

Leslie nodded. "So do I," she said. "Unfortunately, nobody else will, so I guess you'd better get dressed before Carl Johan decides to break the door down." With a laugh, Christian conceded to her advice, and swiftly donned his little-used black royal military dress uniform. Leslie herself was wearing an understated black dress with matching shoes, her only jewelry her wedding rings and the ruby necklace Christian had given her for her birthday, which she wore almost all the time.

Once dressed, Christian ducked into the bathroom and gave his hair a vigorous rubbing with a fresh hand towel, shook his head hard a few times and then sighed. "They'll just have to accept my wet hair. My Rose, is there a comb out there somewhere?" Leslie brought him the hairbrush he'd thrown aside earlier, making him grin at her, and he put his glossy dark-brown hair in order. "Oh, and my wedding ring…"

"Right here." Leslie smirked at him and displayed it before his eyes.

"Mind-reader." Christian kissed her quickly, took it from her and slid it on. "That's it, then. Let's go." He offered her his arm, and she linked hers through it and walked into the corridor with him. Carl Johan nodded approval.

"Good," he said. "By the way, it's begun to rain."

"That figures," Christian said. "I assume the cemetery has prepared accordingly."

"They should have," Carl Johan said, falling into step on the other side of Christian so that they walked three abreast down the hall. "Anna-Kristina has done an admirable job these last few days, continuing her role as Arnulf's secretary. She made all arrangements for the memorial service and the funeral, helped Kristina handle responses to condolences and notifications of the arrival of all guests from abroad, and even kept the servants calm. She should serve Gabriella well after the coronation."

Christian nodded, impressed. "Good for her. Maybe she's finally learning some self-reliance—she seems to be showing true strength here." They descended the staircase and made their way out to the great entry, where the rest of the family was gathered, waiting for them. Anna-Kristina detached herself from the group and hugged Christian hard.

"I'm so glad you're back to normal again," she said fervently. "Gerhard and Rudolf told us the whole story. Why would you go to the dungeon?"

"Not now, Anna-Kristina," Carl Johan said before Christian could tell her the same thing. "Perhaps tomorrow, when things are a little quieter. We simply must get going."

Christian turned to Leslie. "Obviously this is going to be another televised event," he told her. "If you see helicopters outside the car windows, that will be the media, seeing to it that the entire world doesn't miss a single move we make. The memorial will be on television as well, and I think the funeral will be too…Anna-Kristina?"

"I couldn't stop them," she said. "I asked if the funeral could be broadcast only in Lilla Jordsö, though. Our people have the right to grieve with us, but I don't think the rest of the world really needs to see it. I only hope they listened to me."

"We'll find out," Carl Johan said. By now they had all filed outside; there were two cars waiting, one for Kristina, Carl Johan and Amalia, Christian and Leslie, and Anna-Laura; the other for Anna-Kristina, Gabriella and Elias, Margareta, Gerhard and Liselotta, Rudolf, Cecilia and Axel, and Roald. Once in the first car and moving down the long castle drive, Leslie finally got a good look at Kristina, whom neither she nor Christian had seen since the moment they'd joined the other Enstads in seclusion at the castle. Kristina was a bit pale and solemn-faced, but appeared composed; when she caught Leslie's eye, she smiled faintly and reached out to grasp Leslie's hand for just a moment.

Anna-Laura studied her younger brother. "Christian, are you all right?" she asked with particular meaning.

Christian said quietly, "If you mean have I regained my sanity, then I'm quite back to normal, thank you. I won't pretend that everything is perfect—I still haven't come to terms with the fact that I even entertained the idea of Arnulf's death. But Leslie grounded me." He shifted enough to wrap his arm around Leslie's shoulders.

Kristina said something, and Christian smiled and nodded slowly, his eyes misting. Anna-Laura said gently to Leslie, "Kristina says that you're a godsend, Leslie. If it weren't for you, Christian might be altogether something different from the prince we once knew before he was thrown into marriage with Marina."

Leslie wished she could think of something gracious to say; she could feel her face getting hot with embarrassment. Finally she said softly, "I love him…that's all there is to it."

"That's all there needs to be," Christian said, hugging her for a moment.

The group was silent after that; Carl Johan and Christian clung to their wives' hands, and Kristina and Anna-Laura seemed to share a wordless understanding. That allowed the chopping noise of helicopters overhead to be heard, and they all exchanged wry, knowing glances. There would be no privacy here, to be sure.

The scene of the memorial service was a massive Lutheran church on the eastern side of Sundborg; limousines and official cars in both black and white, along with what appeared to be every patrol car on the city police force, choked the roads as far as they could see. The royal family's two-car cavalcade was instantly recognized and allowed through, crawling along the roadway between endless lines of parked cars and occasionally stopping to let people cross the street. Parking in the church lot was severely restricted; two spaces had been reserved for the Enstads' cars toward the back so that they could enter unmolested through a rear door. The family had a police escort inside; Leslie shot Christian a look that conveyed utter, overwhelmed bewilderment, and he promptly curled a protective arm around her and kept it there until they were seated in the pew reserved for them.

"You're not used to this at all, my Rose, are you?" Christian murmured sympathetically when she laid her head on his shoulder. "It's not an easy thing, having your every emotion broadcast to all the world. But think of poor Kristina, and the girls, grieving as they are. I think Kristina is worse off than any of the rest of us."

"I wish I knew _jordiska,"_ Leslie said. "I feel as if I'm being rude, since I can't talk to her. I think that's why I'm so uneasy…it's not the media exposure, it's the feeling that I'm an intruder here, somehow."

Christian huddled her close. "Now, you know better than that, my darling. You're my wife, did you forget? You're as much an Enstad as any of the rest of us, even if you're still the newest family member. Don't let anyone make you feel that you don't belong. You do, and if there's any doubt, I'll set them straight without further ado. Kristina knows why you weren't able to come and see her—Carl Johan explained everything to her."

"Oh," Leslie murmured, looking sheepishly at him. "You must really think I'm being silly. I can't blame you."

"I think you're beautiful," Christian whispered and kissed the top of her head. "I love you, you know, no matter how silly you are. Just stay right by me, you'll be fine."

They talked a little from time to time, sitting there waiting for all the mourners to file in and take their seats. Once Leslie sneaked a cautious glance behind them over Christian's shoulder, trying to see if she recognized anyone, but the endless faces were all unfamiliar and a little intimidating to her. When she turned back around, she noticed that Christian was watching her with open amusement. "Did you see anyone you know?"

"Like who?" she asked innocently.

He grinned. "Like Queen Michiko, for example?"

She knew she must be turning red at being caught out, but gave him a look of overdone affrontery. "Well, who else would I be looking for?" Christian began to laugh, trying his best to keep it under control, and hugged her briefly.

"We better watch it…I think we're on the edge of being irreverent," Leslie whispered into his ear, and Christian promptly dissolved into a coughing fit from nearly choking on his laughter. Beside them, Carl Johan gave them a startled look, but Amalia was smiling broadly at them, clearly understanding them.

Finally it was time for the memorial service, and Christian and Leslie settled into the same solemn silence as the other Enstads, holding hands for mutual support while the minister spoke and several very prominent world leaders delivered brief eulogies. One of these was King Errico, with Queen Michiko at his side; Michiko caught Leslie's eye and the two friends traded very quick smiles of greeting.

Kristina then arose, with Anna-Kristina, Gabriella and Elias, and Margareta behind her, and walked up to take her turn at saying a few words. She didn't get far before the tears began to flow; Anna-Kristina, her emotions as always right out there for all to see, promptly followed her mother's lead, with big tears rolling down her cheeks. Her two sisters were silent, but their faces were filled with sorrow. Elias stood behind Gabriella with his hands on her shoulders. When Kristina finished speaking, Carl Johan and Amalia arose next, followed by Gerhard with Liselotta and then Rudolf. Carl Johan delivered his eulogy to his brother first in _jordiska_, then in English; he too kept it short.

Anna-Laura then got to her feet and started up front, with Cecilia, Axel and Roald trailing her. Only when she reached the podium did she look up, and spoke about some favorite memories she had of Arnulf, also in both _jordiska_ and English.

That left Christian and Leslie; her stomach rolled nervously and she clung tightly to his hand. She felt an absurd relief that she didn't have to say anything, and then wondered what Christian had in mind. Though she had no idea where the television cameras were, she nevertheless kept her eyes on Christian, who for the first time had a lost look about him.

Taking his brother's and sister's leads, Christian spoke slowly in his native language, without focusing on anyone in particular. Toward the end of his speech Leslie heard her own name and fielded a quick glance from him; then he hesitated, cleared his throat and switched to English.

"I had to think very hard about what I should say here today," Christian said, as if he had to choose his words. "And I am afraid I had to come up with those words in the space of a mere half hour or less. Arnulf's passing came as a great shock to me. To all of us, of course, but in my case I think it was a bit different. My brother and I had a somewhat strained relationship, as has been revealed in the press during the last year or so. When my wife and I came here a few days ago at his request, I had no idea what I should expect. He had been asking to see me. I will be forever grateful that he and I made our peace before he died. As it was, I lost my way, mentally, for a little while.

"I can only say that I am grateful to Arnulf for letting me join the love of my life, for it was Leslie who brought me back. She has been my anchor in these last few crazy days, and it's been with her help that I have been able to accept Arnulf's death and to wish him well in whatever journey he may now be making. We will miss you, Arnulf, all of us." He looked down, tugged gently once at Leslie's hand and stepped down; she automatically fell in by his side. When he took his place at the end of the family line, he turned all at once to Leslie and hugged her hard. "It was worse than I thought," he whispered to her and swallowed thickly, then began to cry silently, his body spasming against hers with gentle sobs.

"It's all right, my darling," Leslie soothed him quietly, returning his hug in equal measure and slowly caressing his back. She supposed, privately, that they were probably the center of attention for all those TV cameras out there, but she was past caring. All that mattered now was Christian.

She watched surreptitiously over his shoulder as she comforted him, while the minister spoke again at some length. For once Leslie was grateful for wordy preachers, for it gave him time to regain his composure. By the time the pallbearers—Carl Johan, Christian, Gerhard, Rudolf, Roald and Elias—were required to go forth and shoulder the king's coffin, he was ready to do his share of the duty. Just before joining his brother and nephews, he cast her a quick smile of gratitude, which she returned.

Anna-Laura and Kristina walked immediately behind the pallbearers with the coffin; in their wake were Amalia and Leslie, and behind them in twos, Anna-Kristina and Gabriella, Margareta and Liselotta, with Axel and Cecilia bringing up the rear. Though there had been no time for anyone, even Christian, to brief her on procedure, she had seen a few similar funerals on television in the past, and was prepared to follow the lead of those around her. She kept an eye on Christian ahead of her in order to focus.

An enormous hearse waited out front, a Rolls-Royce in fact, as Leslie noticed with some surprise. It reminded her once more that royalty was different from ordinary people, and again she felt out of place. The women and Axel stopped just at the end of the walk leading to the church steps, waiting while the six pallbearers carefully deposited the coffin into the back of the hearse and then stepped back, straightening to their full heights and watching in tightly controlled silence while the driver closed the hearse and went around to the front, preparatory to leading the funeral procession.

In front of them Kristina suddenly broke down into helpless weeping; Anna-Laura hugged her sister-in-law, visibly trying with little success to control her own tears. An odd weight settled over Leslie's chest and she thought for a moment that she might have trouble breathing. The pallbearers came back to join the others, and to Leslie's relief they paired off; Christian wordlessly slid an arm around Leslie's waist and ushered her along, falling into step behind his brother, sister and two sisters-in-law with the others following. Relieved for his presence, she relaxed slightly and felt the weight recede.

Once more they split into the same two groups for the trip to the cemetery. No one said a word all the way there, and unfortunately it was a rather long trip, back through the city and up the coastal route to a village known as Ormslandning—or, as Christian told Leslie when he spoke at last, Ormsvärd's Landing, the purported site where Lilla Jordsö's first king and his band of followers had come ashore from their legendary swim. It was here that all the Enstad ancestors were buried. Leslie had expected the cemetery to be quite large; in actual fact it covered about two acres and still wasn't full. By now she was very uneasy and a little afraid for Christian, for he looked withdrawn and very somber.

Once they had alighted from the car and were walking towards the gravesite in the rain, Leslie finally dared turn to him. "Christian, my love?" she whispered. "Are you sure you'll be all right?"

Christian looked at her as if mildly startled, then quirked a fleeting smile and nodded. "I ask only that you hold me," he said softly.

Her hand, settled on his waist, rose to caress his back again, and she nodded. "You know I will," Leslie said. "Anything you ask, my darling."

Christian tightened his hold on her but dropped back into silence, and she subsided, not completely reassured. It was new for her to see this side of him, and she fervently hoped his lingering disquiet over his reactions to Arnulf's death wouldn't overcome him as it had earlier that day.

Unlike the memorial service, the funeral was private—only the Enstads, along with Rudolf's girlfriend Liliana, and about two dozen family friends whom Leslie had never met. As the funeral service progressed, she found her mind skipping to one inane topic after another: wondering how many of these family friends Christian, personally, considered his friends; wishing it would stop raining; thinking it might be a good idea to call Roarke as soon as they'd returned to the castle. They were standing under a canopy to keep them relatively dry, but the day was perfectly suited to the overall mood. Leslie stood fully in Christian's embrace, her arms wrapped firmly around him, both of them staring at the coffin but only half seeing it. She could feel tremors deep within him again.

The lowering of the coffin into the grave was excruciating and seemed to take forever. Just as the family finished dropping flowers in atop the coffin, there was a vivid flash of lightning and, a bare second later, a crack of thunder. Startled exclamations rang out; Leslie emitted a cry of fright and buried her face in Christian's shoulder.

"_Herregud,"_ she heard Christian say, and then he kissed the top of her head and began to rock her just a little. As the first surge of terror subsided, she realized his internal tremors were gone, and a thread of relief at this snaked through her before another roar of thunder sounded and made her cringe against him. Now she was the one trembling.

Behind her someone asked Christian a question in _jordiska_, and he replied with a trace of amusement in his voice, running his hand up and down her back. Low chuckles sounded; she felt Christian's resonate through her and was curiously comforted by this. Then, unexpectedly, Christian tugged gently at her hair, making her look up. "My turn to ask," he said, smiling. "Are you going to be all right, my Rose?"

Lightning flared around them. "No," she cried and clutched him again; out of nowhere Christian burst into laughter over the thunder.

"You're truly priceless, my darling," he said, holding her tightly. "I guess I should have explained to Arnulf that you're frightened of thunderstorms. I honestly think this is his way of telling me goodbye—he knew how much I enjoy them."

"Well, tell him not to say it so damn loud," Leslie retorted, shivering, and again Christian laughed and squeezed her, rocking her back and forth from one foot to the other.


	5. Chapter 5

§ § § -- June 30, 2001

"You've been through a great deal, child, you and Christian both," Roarke said gently, his voice thankfully clear through Christian's cell phone. "I think the very worst should be over now, but you must understand that Christian's emotions will continue to be muddled for some time yet to come. They may manifest themselves in unusual ways, so try to be prepared for anything. How is he doing now?"

"He's asleep right now," said Leslie, taking comfort from this simple contact with her father. "After the horror he put himself through, especially yesterday, and all those ups and downs during the memorial and the funeral, the castle doctor thought he'd be better off with something to help him sleep, so he gave Christian a mild sedative. So far he's been sleeping peacefully, for the first time in about three days. I thought it would be a good time to give you a call and let you know how things are going…and I have to tell you, it's such a relief to be able to talk to you. I don't remember going through all this when I lost Mom."

"You were younger," Roarke said, "and you internalized your emotions in those days as well. The circumstances are different here, primarily due to Christian's shaky relationship with Arnulf, but I believe he has an excellent chance of recovery in the wake of their long talk Tuesday. Just be at his side, Leslie, and if it is harmless to him and others, indulge him whatever strange whims he may conjure up. Your friends have been around throughout the day, telling me they woke early to watch the memorial this morning, and they all found Christian's eulogy quite moving. They're concerned for you both, of course, but they were glad to see that you two have been moving through the grieving process at a reasonable pace. Have you seen or spoken with Michiko yet?"

"We're supposed to be meeting the prominent leaders who came for the funeral, not just the ones who spoke but the ones who simply showed up," Leslie told him. "That's been scheduled for eleven this morning, as I understand it. I should get the chance to talk to her then. I hate to say this, but I can't wait till Christian's title finally gets revoked. I always think they're talking to someone else whenever someone addresses me as 'princess'…all I can say is, I'm glad nobody's called me 'Your Highness'. That'd be just too surreal. As it is, it's a little unnerving hearing them call Christian that."

Roarke laughed. "I'm sure it is. But you are a princess, albeit temporarily, and from the little I've seen and heard, you've adapted very well. I know there are many petty worries plaguing you in addition to the aftermath of the king's death, but keep in mind that your main job is just to be there for Christian. As you heard in his speech, he is and will continue to be very grateful for that. I am afraid I had better return to work. Take care of him, Leslie, and don't forget to take care of yourself as well."

"I will," Leslie promised. "Thank you, Father, I feel better now."

"Good," Roarke said warmly. "Try to sleep, sweetheart, and give Christian my best as well. Good night."

She replied in kind and broke the connection, drew in a deep breath and stretched. In the wake of her conversation with Roarke, she felt as if her emotional batteries had been recharged, and it gave her the courage to slip back into Christian's old room and climb back into the bed beside her slumbering husband, using the soft illumination from a nightlight that a servant had installed in the bathroom at someone's behest.

From nowhere there was a distinct rumble, and Leslie sighed. _Not another thunderstorm,_ she thought. They had been coming and going all night, ever since the funeral, and with Christian sedated into sleep she figured she would have to endure this one on her own. She watched as Christian slept; for the first time since leaving Fantasy Island, his face bore a peaceful look that broke Leslie's heart. She knew from experience that only time would heal this new wound he bore, and she wished it hadn't had to happen to him. Seeing him in pain was enough to break her own spirit. Sternly she warned herself not to awaken Christian no matter how bad the storm got. She was too old for this kind of silly fear anyway.

Leslie leaned over and placed a gentle, lingering kiss on Christian's lips, then curled up against him, taking his hand in hers. He stirred languidly beside her and sighed, then sank deeper into sleep. It was almost three in the morning and she hadn't slept that much, due to the storms; she began to wish she'd asked for a sedative as well.

She must have dozed off after all, for when a huge boom of thunder shocked her back to full consciousness, Christian was awake and just pushing himself into a seated position. Leslie's startled jerk in the bed drew his excited attention. "It's storming again," he said. "Come with me to the atrium, my Rose—we can watch it from there."

"I wish it were possible for me to be deaf just during thunderstorms," Leslie grumbled, and Christian chuckled and kissed her before jumping eagerly off the bed.

"Hurry," he urged. Unable to refuse him and too nervous to willingly endure his absence anyway, Leslie slid off after him. Christian waited just long enough to make sure she was following him before breaking into an all-out run. Leslie tried to keep up, but his added height and longer strides made this impossible—and he was tearing full-tilt down the corridor as he must have done in his childhood, in a hurry to get there and enjoy the storm.

"Christian, wait!" Leslie cried after him.

He glanced back, called out, "Come on!" and just kept going. She didn't catch up with him till he was shoving down on the handle of the atrium door; his face was alight, making him look very boyish. It awoke some elemental reaction in Leslie and she caught his hand to restrain him, then kissed him. Christian forgot the door and responded with enthusiasm—then a crack of thunder startled them apart. "Come on," he said again and towed her after him around the balcony to the glass walls.

It was an awesome sight, to be sure. The entire sky boiled with angry clouds; lightning illuminated sections of sky here and there, and every so often a forked bolt shot across the heavens. There was so much electricity in the air that the thunder was loud and constant. Christian flattened his palms on the glass and leaned against it, his face a mask of delight. "Isn't it beautiful?" he yelled joyously.

Leslie had other words for it, but she was glad to see him so happy and excited. If only he could stay like this…his emotional ups and downs made her a little afraid for his mental stability, and somehow they seemed to come in extremes. His highs were stratospheric, his lows abysmal. As he stood there laughing with the storm, she stared at him, elated for him and frightened for him all at once.

Christian looked at her and beamed. "Come here and really see it, my darling!" he urged and grabbed her hand, bringing her around and stepping behind her so that she found herself facing the storm head-on while he wrapped his arms around her from the back. His timing was perfect: a huge bolt shot out of the clouds and connected them with the roiling ocean. Leslie gasped and tried to back up, only to press harder against Christian. When the thunder reached them a second or two later, she cranked around in his arms and clung desperately to him. His laughter rang out again, inciting fear in her.

"Christian," she cried.

He focused on her and his features softened. "I'm sorry, my Rose…I truly wanted to share this with you. Oh, don't you see? This is _life_, my darling—life in its most basic form! Don't be afraid, just look. This place has stood here for nine centuries and I'm sure it will stand for nine more. And I'm here for you, you know that." He laughed again at another explosion of lightning and thunder, and she burrowed into him, shuddering uncontrollably. To her relief, he had enough presence of mind to hug her close in comfort; he seemed to be all right, just startlingly happy. _So much for the sedative,_ she thought with rueful amusement.

"You know, if you do this often enough, you might cure me of my stupid phobia," Leslie remarked, eliciting yet another laugh from Christian.

"I'd love to do that for you," he said, smiling at her. Something changed in his eyes and he traced her lips, his other hand already stroking with clear intent. "Ah, you should only feel what this is doing to me…" He kissed her deeply, simultaneously moving her hand so that she held his intense heat in her palm. She gasped and moaned into his mouth; she'd never known him to be this highly aroused.

"Christian…" she breathed against his lips. He was already moving against her hand, fast losing control, and before either of them quite realized it he'd lifted her half off her feet and was bracing her against the glass. "Oh my God, Christian…"

He tugged off her clothes, his breath coming fast. "Can't stop…"

"Don't stop," she begged, caught up in the tide, and he smiled for just a moment before finding her and entering her right there. The shock of the cold glass against Leslie's back acted as an added stimulant; and even she forgot nature's fury outside while she and Christian rode out their own storm of passion. Her shriek of his name bounced off the stone walls, and she slowly wilted against him as he found his own frenzied release.

They sank to the floor, Christian cradling Leslie close and kissing her with some urgency. "This is life," he breathed between gasps and kisses. And then she understood: Christian sought to celebrate living, in the face of death.

She kissed him back, her hand in his hair, reveling in his fervent response. There was a persistent sense of urgency about him in the way he kept threading his fingers through her hair, huddling her against him so hard that she felt his rapid heartbeat in contrast with her own, his other hand frantically caressing her back and repeatedly pressing her closer. As a result, she reached another unexpected peak, surprising both of them and then making Christian laugh again, softly, with a note of triumph.

"We're alive, my darling," he whispered to her, still breathing a little heavily. "We're alive, you and I. Let them try to take that from us."

"I know," Leslie agreed, matching his whisper, plucking at his upper and then lower lip in turn with little kisses. "I know…we're alive, and I'm so in love with you…"

Christian swallowed her words and his moan in another kiss. Clinging to her, he broke a moment later, his eyes closing, his breathing rate not quite back to normal. "I love you so, my Leslie Rose…if you could feel how deeply in love with you I am, it would—it would, oh, what's your phrase? It would—blow your mind, is that what you say?"

She giggled softly. "That's the phrase, and you're right, I think it would." She gave him one last kiss and then regarded him with every bit of her love for him shining from her eyes. "Come to think of it, you already did."

They chuckled together. "You blew mine too, I think," Christian agreed. "I don't know what happened, but I've never felt like that before. I never even knew it was possible. Oh, listen, my darling, do you hear that?"

Leslie stilled in his arms. "Hear what?" she asked after a moment.

"That's precisely the point. The storm is gone," he said, and grinned lovingly at her. "We'll cure you of that phobia of yours yet, my Rose, I promise. Perhaps tomorrow night we can come back here and I'll show you the stars."

"I just saw them," Leslie whispered, caressing his face, and Christian smiled, his eyes misting. Once more they kissed; then he set her back, rising and helping her to her feet. They dressed at leisure, then strolled out of the atrium hand in hand.

Back in the bedroom, Christian yawned and took note of the time. "So it's going on towards four," he murmured. "No wonder I feel so sleepy. Maybe that sedative is coming back to haunt me too, I don't know…but I have to tell you, I feel calm, back to my normal self." He smiled at her hope-filled expression. "I think I've finally found my peace."

"Thank heaven," she breathed with enormous relief, hugging him hard. "I've been so afraid for you, Christian, my love. I know you were going through hell for a while, and I was worried it was going to harm you permanently."

He kissed her forehead. "Quite honestly, my Rose, I think all the credit is yours. If it weren't for you and your love, I don't think I would have made it. I've been following that light you kept shining in the dark, and it led me back. I hope Carl Johan can find as much comfort in Amalia, and I wish Anna-Laura could know the sort of love with someone that I've found with you." He squeezed her, then smiled at her. "We'd better try to get some sleep. There are too many people to meet in only a few hours, and I'm sure they wouldn't appreciate our falling on the floor at their feet." She laughed agreement; they climbed back into bed and fell asleep still holding hands.


	6. Chapter 6

§ § § -- June 30, 2001

Yawning all the way, Christian and Leslie made their slightly belated appearance at the breakfast table just past nine that morning, making everyone else look up. "Why on earth are you two so drowsy-looking?" Anna-Laura asked.

"The storms kept me awake," said Leslie, which was actually very much the truth.

"Hm, I guess that explains you," Anna-Laura said, "but Christian was under a sedative and he's still yawning. What's your excuse?"

"The sedative," Christian said easily, hiking an eyebrow at his sister. "It hasn't worn off yet, not completely. In any case, I was awake for some time last night myself. Have you finished grilling us, then? We'd like to eat."

Anna-Kristina looked up. "Did you make Aunt Leslie go to the atrium last night and watch the storms with you?"

"He dragged me down there kicking and screaming," Leslie said, straight-faced.

"Well, certainly screaming," Christian put in, in a soft, wicked voice. Anna-Kristina and her sisters exploded with giggles; Anna-Laura grinned widely, and even Carl Johan couldn't keep back a grin. Leslie shot Christian a look that made him smirk.

"What are you three doing over there?" Leslie asked, having noticed Anna-Kristina, Gabriella and Margareta hunching over a yellow legal pad, whose top page was about half full of handwriting. Arnulf's daughters looked up again.

"We're trying to collect all the songs we want to play at Briella's coronation party," Anna-Kristina explained. She suddenly brightened and poked her sister. "Briella, we should ask Aunt Leslie for some ideas. She's much closer to us in age, and she might like some of the same music we do. The others are just too old…"

"Thanks a lot," said Anna-Laura, Carl Johan and Christian in nearly perfect chorus, which made everyone burst out laughing. Anna-Kristina reddened but giggled.

"I don't mean it as an insult, but even Uncle Christian grew up with different music from ours. For all I know, his favorites are even different from Aunt Leslie's," she said and turned to Christian and Leslie. "Did you ever compare your musical tastes?"

"Only insofar as we spoke of which types of music we like," Christian said, pulling out a chair for Leslie and then taking the one next to her. "But now that I think about it, we never really listed our favorite songs or artists. I see no reason we shouldn't at least overlap, though, since we're only seven years apart in age; and Leslie is that much older than you are, _Kattersprinsessan_. If your tastes and hers happen to match anywhere, then I'm sure hers and mine will do the same. What do you have on that list now?"

The three sisters read off a collection of songs that made Carl Johan and Anna-Laura look at each other with some confusion; Christian frowned slightly, and Leslie simply listened, blank-faced. When the princesses looked up and took in the others' expressions, they exchanged glances. "There's something wrong with those?" asked Gabriella.

"I realize this is to be your coronation party, Briella, but you must remember that not all the guests will be under 30," Christian said dryly. "I've never heard of most of those, and judging from Leslie's expression, neither has she."

"Really, Anna-Kristina, you were born early enough that I'd think you'd be into at least some 80s music," Leslie said quizzically. "Even if you're not, you shouldn't rule out 70s and 80s stuff, and maybe some 60s music too, for the old folks."

Christian chortled gleefully at that. "She means you, _äldrebror,"_ he twitted Carl Johan.

"Don't even speak to me. I'd rather listen to jazz," Carl Johan said good-naturedly. "If you three are really serious about providing music to satisfy all tastes, then I think you're better off hiring a professional disc jockey. They have everything you can think of and more that you can't, if I can judge from the one who played the music at Christian and Leslie's wedding reception."

"Not only that, but you should make sure he takes requests," Leslie put in. "I'm sure people will want to hear their favorites."

"Then after we've greeted all the dignitaries who came here for Pappa's funeral," said Anna-Kristina hopefully, "would you help us think of some?"

"Sure," said Leslie, "it sounds like fun. But don't you think you're forgetting someone? I mean…" She turned to Christian. "That is, if you're willing, my love."

"Well," Christian noted, in that same dry tone, "the old folks do need a representative at this brainstorming session, so I may as well be the one."

"Oh, you're not so old, Uncle Christian," Gabriella said, shooting Anna-Kristina a quick look.

Christian gave her the raised-eyebrow look. "Not 'so' old? As opposed to what, the Sphinx? I don't know how I should take that, Briella."

"Stop it, Uncle Christian," Anna-Kristina and Gabriella protested in unison, touching off more laughter and loud snickers from Margareta. Grinning, Christian desisted, and he and Leslie settled back as servants filled their plates and started rounding the table. One asked Anna-Laura a discreet question, which she replied to at some length, and the servant nodded and left the room.

In English Christian asked his sister, "You say Kristina isn't coming up?"

"She's not ill," Anna-Laura said, "she merely prefers to be alone for now. She will be taking breakfast in her suites, and when it's time for the family to come out and acknowledge our guests, she will join us. Oh, yes, Leslie, will you satisfy my curiosity? I saw the queen of Arcolos look at you just after the king's eulogy yesterday. Do you know her?"

Leslie looked up in surprise. "You didn't know? Michiko and I have known each other since we were thirteen. She's a native of Fantasy Island and was the first friend I made there when I came to live with Father. I'm hoping she and I can find a chance to talk."

Anna-Laura looked impressed. "I had no idea, no. But you shouldn't have trouble finding a chance to speak with her. The Arcolosian contingent is planning to remain in Lilla Jordsö throughout Gabriella's coronation and party, and I saw to it that they were offered suites right here in the castle."

Christian saw Leslie's astonished look and grinned. "That's what's on the other side of the great entry," he said. "Our suites are in the northern wing of the castle, and the southern wing is composed of guest suites for other royal families and similar lofty personages. Admittedly, there is a great deal of wasted space in this monstrosity…and Anna-Laura, exactly which ancestor decided to make this place big enough for its own post-code?"

Anna-Laura shrugged. "It wasn't so much one ancestor as several," she said, "in the time of the series of kings called Erik. I believe Erik II began expanding the place, and it took nearly a century before Erik V decided he had enough living quarters."

"Ah, so we can blame the Eriks for taking up half the land space in the country," said Christian humorously. "Leslie, my Rose, that does it: if we have a son, we're not going to name him Erik." That brought on more laughter, and conversation was encouragingly light and cheerful throughout the meal.

Once breakfast was over, Christian and Leslie retreated with the others to their respective rooms, preparatory to dressing for their day-long meeting with those who'd come to pay their respects—and it was then that the nerves hit Leslie full-on. "What on earth am I going to wear?" she asked, stunned, standing in the middle of Christian's old room with him picking unconcernedly through his own suitcase. "I don't have anything—"

"Of course you do, you brought a whole suitcase full of clothes," Christian said a bit absently. "Never understood how a woman can stand in front of a closet exploding with clothing and scream that she has nothing to wear. Every time Anna-Kristina says it, I want to have her tested for blindness. Now if you—Leslie, where are you?" He'd finally looked up, only to discover that Leslie had left the room. Christian dropped the shirt he'd been looking at and stuck his head out the door, catching sight of her half-running down the corridor. He sighed deeply and lit out after her, easily closing the distance between them. "Where exactly are you going, then?"

"To check with your sister. She'll have better advice than 'of course you do'," Leslie said, not without affection. "Christian, I love you more than anything else on earth, but in this instance you're just not much help." At his expression of outrage, she shrugged with mock apology and grinned. "Hey, it's a girl thing."

"It seems so," Christian agreed, shaking his head, "since I just don't understand it. I suppose my poor male brain simply isn't up to the task."

"You said it, not me, my love." Leslie giggled and trotted off again; Christian came determinedly after her and caught her, stopping her once more.

"Now, just one minute. I want you to explain something to me. You packed a suitcase with all kinds of things. You have jeans, you have T-shirts, you have at least two dresses that I've seen, and you have some nightclothes, though to be honest with you I didn't see much reason for you to bring those." This came out with a smirk that made Leslie roll her eyes and grin good-naturedly. "Come back here with me right now, Leslie Enstad, and show me exactly what you have, and while you're doing that, you can explain to me why none of those items is suitable."

Leslie stared at him. "You're kidding, right?"

"I am deadly serious, and if I have to use force to prove it to you, I will. Show me."

A devilish twinkle entered her eyes. "What if I don't want to?"

"Then I'll make you do it." Christian promptly made good on his word and scooped her off the floor, carrying her easily back to their temporary sleeping quarters. The moment he lifted her, Leslie burst out laughing and couldn't seem to stop the entire way back, which got her a series of increasingly dirty looks from Christian but no other response.

In the bedroom he set her down just in front of her suitcase, then took one step back, planted his hands on his hips and looked at her expectantly. "I'm waiting."

"Is this the culmination of years of frustration with your niece, the clotheshorse with nothing to wear, and you've decided to take it out on me instead of her?" Leslie asked; all she got in return was a stern look and a shift in Christian's stance. "Oh, fine, all right." She narrowed her eyes at him and deliberately plucked out the shift-and-robe set that she had worn on their wedding night. "I can't wear this, you see, because I'm supposed to wear it only in front of you, and it would get me—and probably you by extension—on the front page of every tabloid on this planet." She dropped it back in, fished out jeans and a T-shirt, and went on, "I can't wear these because they're way too casual. I'd certainly be a sight in this outfit while all the rest of you, not to mention those important politicos, are mixing and mingling in business suits and so forth." By now Christian had folded his arms over his chest and was beginning to glare; Leslie ignored this and blithely made another selection, this time a swimsuit. "You insisted I bring this, though we haven't seen the slightest trace of a swimming pool yet, and I have no doubt the North Sea is on a par with freshly melted ice for temperature. And I can't wear this either: again, the tabloids would be on it like fleas on a dog." She held it up for him to examine.

Christian reached out with overdone care and deliberately removed the suit from her grasp, dropping it back into the suitcase. "Leslie, my patience is very low," he warned her quietly. "Show me a dress and explain to me why it isn't suitable."

Leslie studied him a little warily for a moment before deciding to humor him. She lifted out the black dress she had worn to the funeral and turned to face him. "I wore this yesterday," she said simply.

"So?" said Christian. "If you can't wear the same thing two days in a row, then fine; but where's the dress you wore when we spoke with Arnulf?"

Leslie found it and held it up against herself; it was a lovely, ice-blue satin-and-chiffon creation with three-quarter-length sleeves and a modest V-neck that had perfectly accommodated her ruby heart necklace. "Too flashy," she said.

Christian stared at her incredulously. "Too flashy?" he repeated in disbelief. "Tell me, what do you expect Michiko to be wearing? What do you expect all the women to be wearing? What did _you_ expect to wear?"

"Just a minute, Christian," Leslie said, finally beginning to lose her calm, "what's the story here? Like I said, is this some sort of retaliation for Anna-Kristina always claiming she had nothing to wear? Just for your information, nobody could have foreseen that Arnulf wasn't going to survive his heart attack. We didn't expect to be attending a funeral and facing kings, queens, presidents, ambassadors, and so on. These are the only two dresses I brought with me. And guess what else: we're expected to be here for your niece's coronation as well. If you think I had barely anything suitable for a funeral and a meet-and-greet, then just wait till you see what I wear to that—as long as you're prepared to watch me walk out in public in my birthday suit!"

Before he could reply to that, Anna-Laura appeared in the doorway. "I don't believe this: Christian and Leslie, arguing? What about?"

"Clothes, of all things!" Christian exclaimed, throwing his hands in the air. "Leslie claims she has nothing to wear to meet all the dignitaries! Look at this dress she's holding right now and tell me that isn't proper to wear!"

Anna-Laura waited till Leslie had turned her back on Christian to display the dress in question; then she nodded. "That will be fine, Leslie," she said, "but I seem to remember seeing you wearing that the day you and Christian met with Arnulf. Do you have any other dresses with you?"

"No, just this and the one I wore to the funeral," Leslie said.

"Then we'd better take you shopping," Anna-Laura decided. "Don't worry, I'll go with you, and so will Anna-Kristina."

"What about Gabriella's coronation?" Leslie asked a little frantically. "I mean…this calls for formal gowns and that sort of thing, doesn't it? I remember that scene in _My Fair Lady_ where Audrey Hepburn was meeting a bunch of royal types, and everybody was decked out in tuxes and elegant dresses and impossibly expensive jewelry, and the women had their hair in all these elaborate dos, and some of them were even wearing those elbow-length gloves! And oh God, imagine the ten-inch heels I'm probably going to have to wear with a dress like that! Anna-Laura, I'm a complete klutz! I break my ankles in shoes like that, and I practically punched a hole in Christian's foot with one once, and—" She finally sputtered to a halt when Anna-Laura and Christian both broke down into loud, hysterical laughter.

Christian snagged her from behind and hugged her hard, dress and all, convulsing with mirth. "Leslie, my darling, do you realize what you sound like? Never in my life did I think I'd hear words like those coming from you! My Rose, I love you desperately, but I do wish you'd calm down and stop sounding like some foolish little spoiled brat who never does anything but worry about what she looks like. I apologize for quite nearly losing my temper, but to be entirely honest, I was getting upset with you because you were turning into some flighty, clothing-obsessed little thing, and I know you're much more sensible than that. As Anna-Laura said, she and Anna-Kristina will go shopping with you, so that you can find something to wear to the coronation especially. But for now, please, let me see the sweet, grounded woman I fell in love with, all right?"

Leslie had been staring up at him all the way through this; she looked now at Anna-Laura and said, "Does Anna-Kristina really have an entire closet filled with clothes, and yet say she has nothing to wear? Christian says she does."

"He's right," Anna-Laura chortled, wiping away tears. "Perhaps you should ask that girl to show you her room, and I'm sure she'll display the contents of her closet to you."

Leslie sighed. "I'd ask to borrow something of hers, but she's a little shorter than I am and it wouldn't fit. Well, okay, then, we'll go shopping." She turned back to Christian and said dubiously, "I suppose you'd rather bow out of that trip."

"You suppose correctly," Christian said, still snickering. "I'll wait till you get back and then have you model your new things for me, and I'll choose the ones you should wear to the coronation and then to the party."

"Two different outfits?" Leslie asked, eyes widening.

"Yes, my darling, I'm afraid so. The coronation is much more formal and ceremonial than the celebration." Christian looked up and, finally serious, remarked to Anna-Laura, "I think we'll have to have some sort of dress rehearsal for that one. She's not at all familiar with this kind of thing, and the protocol is brutal."

Anna-Laura nodded thoughtfully and said, "Perhaps so. Actually, I think we have recordings of Father's coronation and then Arnulf's, and I think it would help her to watch those as well before we have an actual run-through. I'll find the tapes." She left them, and Christian turned Leslie in his embrace, taking the dress from her hands and draping it across the bed, all the while giving her a long, gently reproachful stare.

"What?" Leslie asked, puzzled.

"Don't—I beg of you, don't _ever_—go into such histrionics again, my darling. Maybe you think my reaction is rather extreme; but you have no idea how often I found myself sitting around Anna-Kristina's room while I was a teenager, watching her show off endless fussy, frilly dresses as if she were tripping down a Paris catwalk. When she dressed up, everything had to be just so. Kristina taught me to braid her hair, but that was as far as I was willing to go; in those days we actually kept a hairstylist in the castle, God help us, and that child made endless use of her. There were so many television appearances then. Arnulf and Kristina were quite visible while their daughters were children, and the girls grew up with the belief that they always had to look impeccable lest some wayward television camera happen to catch them out and about." Christian let his head fall back and moaned with the memory. "It made me eternally grateful I was born male. And then I found myself married to Johanna, and she was another clotheshorse. It was just another of the countless reasons I gave her as wide a berth as I could get away with during the three years she was my wife. Then came the women between her and Marina…Ingela and Karin were both high-society types and had a great many elegant clothes. Maria Dahl, the film actress, was a two-month diversion who never stopped checking her image in a mirror. Why I stuck with her for even that long, I'll never know."

"And the singer?" Leslie asked.

"Astrid," Christian remembered. "She wasn't quite as fussy about her clothes—but I must explain to you that she was a punk singer." Leslie's eyes popped, and he grinned ruefully. "Yes, you heard me correctly. If my sister and my nieces were as merciless as I think they were, you're going to find photographs of me with her in those scrapbooks they gave me for my birthday, and you'll see what I mean. And as for Marina…well, she was well aware of her own appearance, primarily because of her having become a princess after Arnulf threw us together. I simply thought all women were like that. Then I met you, and you were comfortable in anything, from your work clothing to swimsuits to that cute little nightshirt you were wearing the night I tried so hard to talk you into marrying me. That was one of at least five dozen reasons I fell so madly in love with you."

"Five dozen, huh?" Leslie murmured, enjoying his monologue. "I'll have to ask you for the other 59 some one of these days. In the meantime, I'm sorry about that, but these fussy formal ceremonies are intimidating the blood out of me. What I'm trying to say is, I'm terrified I'm not going to do you justice—that I'll look ridiculous beside you, especially since you were raised on all this and I'm totally clueless."

"If you walked out in your birthday suit, as you so charmingly threatened to do a few minutes ago, you'd do me more justice than you could ever dream," Christian murmured, kissing her. "Stay clueless, my darling Leslie Rose. It's one of the things that keeps me so in love with you." He forestalled any riposte on her part with another kiss that made her forget forever what she might have said.

Some indeterminate time later Anna-Laura returned and caught them still kissing, so lost in each other that they never heard her even after she cleared her throat three times. At last she took a breath and said with amused exasperation, "Christian Carl Tobias Enstad, you're going to set that room on fire if you don't stop now."

Christian and Leslie broke apart and stared at her, both a little glassy-eyed. After a moment Christian asked, "Why do I get in trouble and Leslie doesn't?"

"Oh, trust me, you'll both be in trouble if you don't get some control over yourselves and start dressing. It's already past ten and the servants have finished setting up the great entry. You don't have time to make love right now." Anna-Laura grinned widely when Leslie hid her face against Christian with embarrassment. "I have the tapes. We'll watch them this evening in the sitting room." She laid a pair of videocassettes on the chair beside the door. "Hurry up." With that, she left.

Christian laughed softly at Leslie. "Oh, come out of hiding, my darling. Truth to tell, I think she's envious. Arnulf should have devoted some effort to marrying her off—she's been widowed for eighteen years. Come on, let's get ready."

"While we're doing that," Leslie said slyly, "you can tell me how on earth you managed to get yourself involved with a punk rocker." Christian's laugh rang halfway down the hall, loudly enough for Anna-Laura to hear it and grin in response.


	7. Chapter 7

§ § § -- June 30, 2001

By late afternoon nearly everyone had come and gone, and Leslie was a little lightheaded with amazement and fatigue, between meeting so many famous faces and standing on her feet all day. Kristina, overwhelmed, had retreated to her rooms again, and her daughters had gone with her. Carl Johan, Christian and Anna-Laura were still dealing with some minor dignitaries who had, by odd coincidence, trapped all three of them in windy conversations at just about the same time; Amalia had gone down to the kitchens to put in orders for the evening meal and advise the servants that there were several royal guests still staying in the castle. Leslie stood alone on the three-tiered dais whereupon reposed an honest-to-goodness throne, in which Kristina had been sitting to receive condolences. It was the only chair on the dais; the others had all been required to stand. She let out a yawn, stepped out of her shoes and settled herself in the throne, since there was no other place to sit and it looked surprisingly inviting. She leaned back against the padded cushions, smiled to herself at how comfortable they were, and closed her eyes.

"When did they crown you, Leslie Hamilton?" teased a soft, familiar voice, and she opened her eyes again to find herself staring at Michiko.

"There you are, finally!" Leslie said happily, jumping up to hug her. Michiko giggled and returned the hug with enthusiasm. "You and Errico came through here so early, I thought you forgot all about us."

"No, we knew you'd all be exhausted by now, and we thought it was better to come in while you were still fresh," Michiko said. "You look about ready to fall asleep, and that throne can't be very cushy."

"Oh, I don't know, it felt pretty good to me," Leslie said, and they both giggled. "So I hear you and Errico are staying in the castle."

"Yes, we're in some very lavish suites," Michiko said, "and Marcolo and Carlono have their own rooms down the hallway. If Christian's family ever decides to downsize, or if they ever need extra income, this place would make a wonderful hotel for the super-rich. Where are you and Christian staying, by the way? The media keeps talking about how the entire royal family shut themselves off in this place after King Arnulf died."

"We did," Leslie said, nodding. "Christian and I took over his old bedroom, the one he had growing up here. I have to tell you, Michiko, I'm looking forward to going home. All this pomp and circumstance is starting to tell on me. Christian's used to it, but it's just plain alien to me."

"I know what you mean," Michiko said sympathetically. "Well, maybe it'll be a little easier for you now. Errico and I will be here with Carlono and Marcolo throughout the coronation, and we've been invited to the celebration gala too, so with any luck you and I can visit. That is, if you and Christian go on staying in the castle."

Leslie shrugged. "We had been staying in the city with Christian's nephew and his wife, who bought his flat when he left," she said. "I don't know if we're going back at all, at least not before Christian and I go back to Fantasy Island. For that matter, I don't even think it's necessarily advisable. Christian's been very hard-hit by Arnulf's death, and he seems to be fine now, but it's still only a few days since it happened and I know it's going to take time before he truly recovers."

Michiko nodded, studying her. "I remember him saying something yesterday at the memorial service about having lost his way mentally. I hope it wasn't too bad."

"It was pretty scary for a while," Leslie said, glancing at her husband, still tethered to some long-winded politician or other. "Maybe there'll be a chance to tell you about it later on. There's just so much for us to talk about." She sank back into the throne, wincing and lifting one foot to rub it. "Ow, my feet are positively killing me. Hey, are you up for a shopping trip? Anna-Laura said she and Anna-Kristina are taking me out to get some suitable outfits for the coronation and the gala, and I thought it would be more fun if you come too. Christian said he's staying here, so we might as well make it girls' day out."

"Oh, you mean a hen party?" Michiko said, grinning. "It really sounds like fun. Of course, you realize the local media will be all over you. I'm surprised your sister-in-law even said anything about going out. They must not know what to do with you."

Leslie grinned ruefully. "They've all been so nice and accepting," she said. "Of course, they might just be really good at hiding their sheer loathing for this ignorant little klutz their younger brother somehow fell for." They both laughed softly. "Like I said, I'm looking forward to going home. Christian and I didn't have time to finish unpacking, and we have to find a chance to do that whenever we do get home."

"I'd love to see your house," Michiko said eagerly. "I'm planning my usual trip home in about six weeks, right around the time Myeko's due to have the baby, and it would be so lovely to come and visit you and Christian. Maureen mentioned you built right across the street from her and Grady, and that has to mean you have a view of the ocean."

"Right out the bedroom," Leslie said, nodding. "We have a French door that opens onto a deck, and one window that we leave open at night, and we fall asleep to the sound of the ocean washing ashore. And you know something? We've apparently got our very own night crier. Its call woke up poor Christian, and he was a little spooked by it. I think it's got a nest in one of our trees—it was quite close by."

Michiko looked envious. "Lucky you! Did you tell Christian it's harmless?"

"The melancholy got to him. We slept only the one night in our own house before we had to come here, since that was the night we were told about Arnulf's heart attack. I think he'll get used to it eventually…if we ever get the chance to acclimate him." She sighed. "I'm feeling really homesick right about now. Don't get me wrong, this is a pretty country, and I got such a kick out of Christian playing tour guide for me the other day; but Fantasy Island is home and it always will be."

Michiko smiled reminiscently. "I know exactly how you feel, believe me. Listen, the men and I have been invited to take dinner with you and Christian and the rest of the family. We can talk more then, okay? I need to get back to our suite and get out of these fussy clothes. I hope they don't mind if I show up for dinner in shorts."

Leslie grinned. "No, I plan on doing the same thing. The family's surprisingly informal in private, I found. Just as well, or I'd be way more nervous than I already am. I'll look forward to it."

"Great, see you then." They grinned at each other and Michiko made her way toward one of the entrances off the south side of the great entry hall. Feeling better, Leslie relaxed in the throne and closed her eyes again, patiently waiting for Christian and letting herself daydream about decorating their new home.

Hmm…has Kristina abdicated the throne, then?" Christian's voice asked humorously then, and Leslie opened her eyes to see him standing in front of her with an amused look on his face. She smiled up at him.

"Naah, I usurped it," she kidded, and Christian laughed, reaching for her hands and pulling her back onto her aching feet. "Ow, here we go again."

"I know how you feel," Christian said ruefully, looking down at their feet and grinning when he noticed her lack of shoes. "You do have a way of going barefoot when it suits you, my Rose. Anna-Kristina made a remark about it a few days ago…and it shocked me to realize she's probably not gone barefoot since she was a toddler. I think I'll have to get into the habit, especially as I live on a tropical island now…" He paused to reflect on that. "By the way…I meant to ask you something. Come on, let's get back to our room; we're through here for today. Dinner won't be for two more hours."

They slid arms around each other's waists and ambled towards the corridor entrance that would take them to Christian's old room. "What was the question?" Leslie asked.

"Oh yes. I was thinking this morning, when we were right in the thick of meeting all those well-wishers, and it occurred to me to recall Arnulf's words about losing my citizenship here once my title is voided. That led to wondering what the citizenship requirements are for Fantasy Island. So I ask you—what are they?"

Leslie thought for a moment. "Wow…I never considered it, for some reason. Let me see if I can dredge my eleventh-grade governmental classes out of the depths of my brain. We had one entire grading period where we studied island law, and…" She trailed off, searching her memory while Christian watched her. "Well, Father's very strict about immigration, so I haven't actually been witness to more than a couple or three of these cases, but recently it came up because of Myeko's marriage. This will apply to you too, my love. If you marry a citizen of the island, you have to wait a year, then you're eligible. So next January 16, you'll officially become a citizen."

Christian stared at her. "But if my title is revoked in the next two or three weeks, as Arnulf suggested, then for a good six months I'm going to be a man without a country."

"Then we'll just have to make sure we're safely back home before you lose your royal status," Leslie said lightly, smiling at him. "Father's not going to penalize you in any way for that. It's just the vagaries of bureaucracy."

"But you know the nature of my work," Christian protested, "where I have to be out and about most of the time…and if I have to leave Fantasy Island for a job, I may run into difficulties. My Lilla Jordsö passport will be invalid, and I won't be able to get a Fantasy Island passport until next year. I think when we return home, we'd better talk to Mr. Roarke about all this."

Leslie regarded him in surprise. "Do you expect to have to make any international travel in the next six months or so?"

"Not right now, but you never know what might come up," Christian said.

"Couldn't you just send Julianne?" Leslie asked.

Christian sighed. "She doesn't have the level of expertise I do. She's good, but her forte is the actual setup; mine is both the design and the setup, and you know I always consult with my clients so that they get exactly what they're looking for. I don't know how this is going to work."

"Me either," Leslie admitted. "Well, as you said, we can talk to Father about it. He might be able to come up with something without having to break the law."

"Or else I just turn down anything off the island till I have a valid passport," said Christian, shrugging. "I'm not even sure I can go to the military base if I must."

"Oh, that's nothing," said Leslie. "They don't even look at passports anyway. All school-age children on the base attend classes on Fantasy Island, and there's a special arrangement to accommodate that. Come on, my love, cheer up. Wouldn't you rather stay close to home for awhile anyway? We've just moved into our house, and right now we're on the other side of the world from home as it is. Maybe you could put a moratorium of some sort on traveling anywhere for work, at least till you've got citizenship."

They shut themselves into Christian's room and he looked doubtfully at her, though there was a little smile on his face. "Appealing in theory, but quite likely impossible in practice. I can only wait and see, and if a situation does in fact come up, I can always go to Mr. Roarke for help then. I suppose we have enough to worry about."

"Yeah, like that shopping trip and this brutal protocol you mentioned this morning," Leslie said, blowing out her breath. Christian grinned and picked up the videotapes Anna-Laura had brought around.

"So these are supposed to be my father's and Arnulf's coronations," he mused, weighing them in one hand. "We'll have to watch these in the sitting room. To be honest, I've never seen these—didn't even know we had them. This could be embarrassing."

Leslie laughed. "I'm looking forward to it."


	8. Chapter 8

§ § § -- June 30, 2001

Anna-Laura brought most of the other Enstads around about half an hour later and led the whole group down to the sitting room. Kristina was still in seclusion, and Margareta had elected to remain with her mother; but Anna-Kristina and Gabriella were there, along with Gerhard and Liselotta, Rudolf, and Carl Johan. Axel and Cecilia, Leslie had learned, tended to keep to themselves; and Roald, being the youngest of the Enstad children, spent a lot of time out and about with friends of his. But she was well on her way to becoming much better acquainted with Gabriella, and getting to know Carl Johan and both his sons, as well as Anna-Laura.

"Now why exactly are we doing this again?" Rudolf asked, making himself comfortable in a chair. "Should I have the servants bring us popcorn?"

"Not if you value your life," Christian told him in mock threat. "This is to help Leslie get some idea of what's expected of her at Gabriella's coronation. Not, of course, that you're going to see everything you need to know, my Rose, but you'll at least have a beginning to work from." He popped in the first tape and started it, then settled down beside Leslie and leaned back with one arm draped over the back of the loveseat behind her. He was amused: she was sitting up almost straight, one arm braced on the chair arm and an anticipatory look on her face. "Tell me, Leslie, what is it you're so eager to see?"

She turned and grinned smugly at him. "You," she said.

"You've seen me," Christian teased her.

"Not at age four, she hasn't," Anna-Laura said with a smirk. "Look, Leslie, before you miss anything. It's starting now."

The picture was in color, surprisingly; it appeared to have been transferred from an old film. While there was sound, there was no narration. "Who shot that, anyway?" Carl Johan wondered idly.

"I'm not sure," Anna-Laura said. "I know it's footage from the original television broadcast, but I didn't realize it was in color. Now, Leslie, here you see the great entry—this is where Gabriella's coronation will be held. This took place the last day of June, 1962. Our grandfather had passed away ten days before that. Now, here comes the family."

Leslie leaned a little farther forward; Christian's nieces and nephews watched with almost equal interest. From one of the corridors that led to the family living quarters marched the Enstad family in solemn formation: a handsome but stern-looking man and a lovely dark-haired woman, followed in single file by their children. The camera followed the couple as far as the middle of the great hall, then spent about a full minute on each of their offspring in turn. First, of course, came Arnulf, who had then been fourteen, looking as stern and solemn as his father. Behind him was Carl Johan, twelve, a boyish look clinging to him despite the trouble he'd obviously taken to look older and dignified. Both boys wore suits and ties. Next came Anna-Laura, then nine, a pretty, slender girl with long dark hair that had been caught up in a tiara. Leslie gasped softly: she was clutching the hand of four-year-old Christian, decked out in a suit and tie just like his older brothers, trailing behind her staring in awe and confusion at all the people.

"Who's that little brat?" Rudolf asked, straight-faced. Laughter broke out and Christian slung a throw pillow at him.

Leslie barely noticed; her eyes were stuck on the sight of the adorable little boy on the television screen. He had the same glossy dark-brown hair, smooth and straight as it was now, and his hazel eyes carried the same sharply intelligent gleam. Anna-Laura looked back on the way up the middle of the hall and tugged impatiently at Christian's hand, saying something that made the boy scowl at her but follow along. That brought on more laughter from the watchers.

"I don't remember that," Christian said from behind Leslie, having evidently been caught up in the filmed proceedings despite himself.

"I do," Anna-Laura said. "You were lagging behind, and I had to keep telling you to face front and pay attention."

"Aha," Christian said. "That's me, Mr. Incorrigible. One of the things I do recall is trying to get closer to Mother and Father so I could touch that crown. Is that here?"

"It should be," said Carl Johan, "because I remember that as well, and the camera was on us the entire time. More so on Mother and Father than us four, but we stood right behind them as you can see here, and we were very much in the picture."

The four children gathered in a solemn little line atop what looked to be the same three-tiered dais they'd been using earlier today, with their parents standing side by side facing several officials in fussy ties and tails; one held a fat purple pillow upon which rested a large, heavy-looking, gold jewel-studded crown. Gabriella asked, "Is that the one they'll put on my head?"

"Yes, but it's a symbol only," Anna-Laura explained. "The days are long gone when the reigning monarch actually wore it, even to formal functions. It goes back to King Lukas I in the sixteenth century; the previous crown was lost to a raid."

"Raid?" echoed Christian, while Leslie avidly watched the tape, where her husband's much younger self was edging forward, his eyes on the crown and his hand outstretched in an attempt to touch. "What sort of raids went on in the sixteenth century? Unless some descendants of old King Ormsskägg's relatives who remained at home decided they wanted to claim blood ties to the family."

Anna-Laura grabbed the pillow Christian had thrown at Rudolf and shied it right back at him. "There were Irish pirates in those days, and they had a way of ranging quite far afield. There were some very bloody battles off our coasts in the 1500s. King Erik VII took a battleship out there himself, with the first crown on so that everyone knew who he was and whose territory they were invading…and was almost immediately run through with a sword. The pirate who killed him seized the crown and tried to jump back aboard his own ship, but the vessels had drifted apart and he misjudged the distance. He and the crown fell into the sea and never came back to the surface again."

"So…the Eriks again. It seems they have a lot to answer for," Christian remarked with a chuckle, glancing at Leslie and then taking a closer look. "Leslie, my Rose, what on earth do you find so fascinating about this thing?"

"Are you blind, Christian?" Carl Johan asked in laughing disbelief. "She's been riveted to the sight of you from the very beginning."

Leslie reached back and caught Christian's arm, pulling it towards her to grasp his hand in hers, without ever taking her eyes off the television screen. "Christian, you were absolutely adorable."

Christian snorted. "That word again! Keep watching and you'll change your tune quickly enough. Didn't I try to run off the dais somewhere along here?" Just as he spoke, the little boy on the screen bolted out from behind his parents and pounded down the tiers; Anna-Laura lunged out after him and snagged the child by his suit jacket. Everyone laughed, both on the tape and in the room, when Christian struggled and yelled in protest. On the tape, Anna-Laura seized his arms and forcibly pulled him back into place, scolding all the while. At this point the camera, whose operator had apparently been unable to resist focusing on the children's antics, brought the adults into view, and the look of angry disapproval on Arnulf I's face was impossible to miss. Christian's mother took the child in hand and straightened his jacket, spoke to him, then said something to Anna-Laura. After that, young Christian found himself restrained throughout the ceremony by his older sister with her hands planted firmly on his shoulders, and it was plain that he didn't like it the slightest bit. He looked thwarted, confused and greatly annoyed all at once.

"You see him squirming there?" Anna-Laura said. "My arms were exhausted by the time the ceremony was over. Rudolf, your question earlier was dead-on."

"About the brat?" asked Rudolf, grinning. "So I see."

"Incorrigible," Christian confirmed cheerfully, wrapping his arms around Leslie from behind and kissing the side of her head.

"But adorable," Leslie murmured, still entranced at the sight of the little boy who would grow into the man she was so in love with.

Christian sighed good-naturedly. "Adorably incorrigible, then. I was bored with the whole thing, and all I wanted was to go back to my room and play. Did you see that look Father gave me?"

"Mmmm, yes, I did," Leslie said. Her eyes shifted to Christian's mother, who she realized was the source of his good looks. "But your mother seemed forgiving enough. What was her name, Christian?"

"Susanna," Christian said softly, now watching the image of his mother on the screen. "Yes, Mother rarely raised her voice to me, as I recall. You see her there now, reminding my father that he must concentrate on the ceremony." He gave a soft, wistful sigh. "I miss her."

"I know how you feel," Leslie murmured, and they shared a look of total understanding that wasn't lost on the others in the room.

They watched quietly after that, while Christian's parents became King Arnulf I and Queen Susanna, and then the tape ended shortly thereafter and Carl Johan got up to eject it from the machine. Christian and Leslie still sat in silence, both lost in memories and images, seeming closed off in a world of their own.

"Pay attention," Rudolf said loudly, jolting them both. They eyed him, and he grinned broadly. "This was supposed to be a lesson for Aunt Leslie, wasn't it?"

"Of sorts," Christian said, "but we'll have to have some rehearsals. As I mentioned, not everything involved in the coronation is on the tape. One of the things you didn't see is the obeisance everyone must make to the newly crowned monarch—and I mean everyone, from the lowliest servant right up to the monarch's own family. Which is what all of us, even Gabriella's own husband and mother, will have to do." He smiled at Leslie's faintly apprehensive look and added, "It's actually not such a long ceremony, perhaps fifteen minutes altogether, but as I said, the protocol is brutal. One aspect of it was instigated by my father after my annoying little performance in 1962. No one in the immediate attending party is allowed to speak, move from the spot, or touch, either another person or any object."

"No smiling, either," said Carl Johan, changing tapes. "Father fumed for several weeks about how you supposedly turned his coronation into a miniature carnival. He wanted solemn reverence, as befitted a king."

"If he wanted that," Christian said, "he should never have insisted that I be witness to the coronation. He knew perfectly well what I was like."

"He meant to teach you a lesson about proper behavior," Anna-Laura said. "Of course it didn't work, but it never occurred to him that he was dealing with a four-year-old child. To his mind, you were a prince, and you should have known how to act like a prince from the very second you were born. There was very little room for error."

"As I learned while growing up," Christian said a little sourly. "Arnulf claimed he didn't hate me, he simply didn't know how to handle me. I'm not completely convinced."

Leslie looked up at him and wondered what sort of mood he was headed for: it was plain he still hadn't reconciled everything. _I'm one to talk,_ she thought, _since I still have an attitude about Michael Hamilton. I guess there are some things you just have to learn to live with…I know that's what Father would tell me._ She patted Christian's knee, and he smiled at her.

Carl Johan started the second tape and retreated to his chair, and their attention went back to the TV set. Leslie recognized this one; it had taken place on December 30, 1995, just over six months before she and Christian had first met. She and her friends had had a get-together at Camille's house to watch the broadcast, since Camille and especially Tabitha enjoyed following the doings of royalty.

Arnulf II looked little different from the way she'd remembered him in the hospital and on other TV appearances; for that matter, all four of Arnulf I and Susanna's children looked essentially as they did now, with somewhat less gray in Arnulf II's hair and none at all in Carl Johan's. As in the 1962 tape, the family emerged from one of the corridors off the great entry, this time followed by their offspring and spouses in the cases of the three oldest. Arnulf and Kristina had Anna-Kristina, Gabriella and Margareta behind them; Carl Johan, walking with Amalia, was followed by Gerhard and Rudolf; and Anna-Laura came along with Cecilia and Roald in her wake. For the most part, unlike their parents, the children looked different, to varying degrees; Gerhard and Anna-Kristina, the two oldest at ages 24 and 23 respectively as of the date of the coronation, looked pretty much as they did now. However, this wasn't true of the other five. Gabriella at 21, Rudolf at 20 and Margareta at 19 looked like college students; and the two youngest, seventeen-year-old Cecilia and fifteen-year-old Roald, still had the last traces of childhood about them.

Behind Cecilia and Roald came Christian, walking alone, expressionless and with a generally solemn mien about him. He wore another royal dress uniform, this one white, giving startling contrast to his dark hair. Leslie, watching him as avidly as she had in the earlier tape, wondered what he must have been thinking. It made her absurdly jealous to realize that, since he hadn't then known she existed, he wouldn't have had his mind on her, as she remembered him telling her he had during Gerhard's wedding. The family proceeded to the dais and stood in a quiet semicircle around Arnulf and Kristina, with Christian ending up at the extreme left-hand edge of the picture. Like the others, he stood in solemn, respectful silence, hands at his sides, eyes trained on the proceedings without ever moving. Leslie remembered watching this broadcast at Camille's house and felt odd to realize that all their attention had been on Arnulf and Kristina; the girls had barely even noticed Christian at all. He'd still been in those halcyon days before he fell in love with Leslie and then discovered himself wedlocked to Marina, and he'd led such a low-key existence that he managed to fade quietly into the background despite his attractiveness.

"What a contrast to 1962, hmm?" Christian murmured to her, amused.

"Completely," Leslie agreed a little absently, still trying to think whether she had taken any kind of notice of him at all in 1995. She half sensed Christian turn to study her, but she was busy racking her memory and didn't really notice. Now that she thought about it, to her disbelief, the only comment she could recall anyone making about Christian was when Myeko had asked who the "hot cutie" was at the left of the screen; Tabitha had told them, "Oh, that's Prince Christian. You never hear anything about him, actually; it's not as if he goes around looking for the spotlight. How odd, I guess he's still single."

"How old is he?" Maureen had asked.

"Thirty-seven," Tabitha had said.

At which point Camille had nudged Leslie and said, "Hey, only seven years older than we are. If you're ever gonna get back into the dating game, Leslie, you could try for that prince…especially before Myeko really gets the hots for him." They'd all laughed, but Leslie could no longer remember what she'd said in response to Camille's remark.

"Earth to Leslie," Christian whispered then, and she blinked and looked curiously at him. "What are you thinking? You looked so far away there."

"I was trying to remember when my friends and I were watching this on TV," she said. "Remember I mentioned we saw you on this broadcast, the first morning after you arrived to set up the island website?"

"Ah, yes, you did," Christian recalled. "You said I looked familiar because of this." His expression grew very curious. "What did you think of me then?"

"About what you thought of me," Leslie teased him.

Christian's expression went a touch befuddled. "But I didn't even know you when this happened…how could I have been thinking of you—?" Then he got it and gave her a dirty look. "Leslie Susan Enstad…"

She giggled and relented. "Well, obviously, we noticed you onscreen. It's only that you were so low-profile back then, and only Tabitha knew anything at all about you. Myeko called you a 'hot cutie', and Camille thought I should go after you."

"Instead I came after you," Christian teased softly, and she grinned. "Oh, you'd better look at this. There's more of this ceremony on tape than there was of my father's. This is where we had to bow in respect to the new king and queen. We were all of equal rank, of course, so it was done in reverse order of age, which means I go first. Watch."

Leslie returned her attention to the tape and gazed on as the royal family, save for Arnulf and Kristina, stepped down from the dais and lined up single file at its foot, with Christian in the lead. Something strange coiled through her when he moved up to the step just below his brother and sister-in-law, paused, then dropped gracefully to one knee and lowered his head. He waited for Arnulf's acknowledgment, then smoothly arose and stepped aside for Anna-Laura and her two children to make their obeisance simultaneously. She shuddered a little in Christian's arms, and again he looked at her curiously. "What's wrong, my Rose?"

"It's just weird to see you pay that sort of respect…I mean, since you're a prince and should be _getting_ it…oh, I don't know how to explain it." She sighed.

Christian chuckled almost inaudibly and murmured, "I think I understand. Believe me, it was no stranger to you to see me do that than it was for me to actually do it, especially considering that Arnulf had long since taken over my father's attempts to control my life and I was feeling particularly rebellious at that point. Unfortunately, I was no longer four years old, and it wouldn't have looked very cute."

"Really? Is that what you were thinking?" Leslie wondered, turning back to him again. "It never showed on your face."

"Then I succeeded in hiding it," Christian said, shrugging. "It was something I learned to do over the years when necessary, in addition to the training I got as I was growing up. No private family affairs to be revealed in public. Watch, Leslie—you need to see how the curtsying is done, for you'll have to do that when Gabriella is crowned."

Leslie watched while Carl Johan, Gerhard and Rudolf performed the same kneel-and-bow that Christian had, and Amalia sank nearly to the floor in a deep curtsy. "Ow," she mumbled and winced. "You men have it a lot easier."

"Can't all women curtsy that way?" Christian wondered.

"Not a born klutz like me," Leslie retorted.

Christian grinned. "We'll teach you how," he said. "We have about ten days in which to turn you into Eliza Doolittle, proper lady. Don't give me that look—I saw that film too, Leslie Enstad." They chuckled together and relaxed into silence, watching as Arnulf and Kristina's three daughters performed their curtsies and moved aside.

The tape faded to black about thirty seconds later, in the midst of assorted dignitaries paying their respects in various and sundry, less formal ways. Carl Johan got up to rewind the tape. "Leslie," he said mischievously to his sister-in-law, "since you were so enthralled by the sight of Christian in these, I'll make copies of them to one tape and send it home with you." He pretended to cringe. "Someone hide the swords—I think Christian is considering running me through."

"Just like old King Erik the forty-first, or whichever one of them lost the crown," said Christian with a smirk. Leslie laughed.

"There have been only thirteen kings named Erik," Anna-Laura said with prim and perhaps somewhat exaggerated dignity, "the last of whom sired our grandfather, King Lukas VI. Have some respect, Christian Carl Tobias. You wouldn't be here if it weren't for them." These words made Christian's expression change momentarily, contort into something that scared Leslie for a moment, before he visibly controlled himself.

"Really?" was all he said, but the word came out tightly. His tone stilled his brother and sister; his nephews and nieces looked on without comprehension. Leslie shifted around on the loveseat and slid both arms around him in an instinctively protective gesture.

Anna-Laura realized then what she had said and sighed. "Christian, none of us would be here, either," she reminded him gently. "Stop, you're frightening Leslie again."

"What's wrong?" asked Anna-Kristina.

"It's a long story," Christian said. "If you ask your aunt or uncle, they may be inclined to tell you. For now, I think Leslie and I need to be alone. We'll see you at dinner. Come on, my Rose, let's go." He didn't give Leslie a chance to react in any way, simply rose, took her hand in his and led her out of the room, leaving behind a heavy silence.

On the landing halfway up the staircase to the second floor, Leslie stopped him and moved around till she was directly in front of him and he had to meet her gaze. "Christian, my darling," she said gently, "don't blame your sister for what she said. It was a perfectly natural thing to say. You know she didn't mean it the way it seemed."

Christian let out a sigh so deep it seemed to empty his entire body, and he hung his head. "I know, my darling, and I'll apologize to her later. But it ran through my mind like a wildfire that it's not Erik XIII to be blamed for my existence, or Lukas VI…it's Arnulf I."

"_Blamed?"_ Leslie echoed and stared at him. Out of the blue, an honest anger sprang to life within her. "I would have said 'credit', Christian Enstad, not 'blame'. And if I ever hear anything else like that come out of your mouth, you're going to regret it—I promise you that much. I hope you're hearing me loud and clear." She turned her back on him and marched on up the stairway.

Christian gaped after her, momentarily too stunned to move; then he leaped back to life and chased her, seizing her arm and stopping her in her tracks. "What was that for?" he demanded, sounding more astonished than upset.

"That was for your persistent self-pity," Leslie said, still angry. "I'm telling you one more time, Christian, stop it. I've reached my limit of hearing how you were some damned mistake. When is it going to get through your head that you're not?" She yanked out of his grasp and stalked away.

Behind her Christian cursed in _jordiska_. "Leslie, for God's sake, will you stop? Or have you decided you've had your fill of me, then?"

She did stop then and turn to stare at him. "Christian, if you put on a poor-me act, you're really going to see my temper short-circuit. But if you want the truth, I don't think I have the right to give you the blasting you probably have coming to you, because I'm still conflicted about Michael Hamilton. Every time I'm on the edge of telling you to stop whining about being an unwanted child, I remember my own self-pity about Michael destroying my life, and that shuts me up. I can't make you see the truth, because I don't seem to be capable of seeing it myself." Leslie half turned away and hung her head, driving both hands through her hair in a weary gesture. "We make some pair, don't we."

"Michael may have destroyed your life," Christian said, surprisingly gently, "but you seem to be overlooking something just as I am. You built a new life out of the ashes of the old one, from the moment Mr. Roarke took you in."

Leslie stilled completely, replaying his last sentence over and over in her head. Then, very slowly, she turned to see Christian still standing some twenty feet away from her down the corridor, watching her soberly but with a quiet warmth in his eyes, and suddenly felt cold without him beside her. At the same time, a strange new light began to dawn in the depths of her mind, in that corner that had always harbored her lingering resentment of Michael, and it made her lower jaw slowly drift downward and her eyes go wide with some ultimate understanding. At last she focused on her husband and breathed in a shaky, wonder-filled voice, "Christian, you're a genius."

His contagious grin broke out then, and he relaxed his stance. "Is that so? Maybe you had better quantify that statement, since if I were truly such a genius, I should have come up with that idea a very long time ago."

"Better late than never?" Leslie suggested, grinning back. That drew a laugh from him, and they both started for each other at once, meeting halfway with a relieved hug. "I think you did something very similar, you know that? Whatever your parents, especially your father, may have planted in your head about your existence being unplanned, you never let it break your spirit. You've said repeatedly that you were rebellious and independent, with a mind of your own. Maybe all the strife your father and brother put you through made you even stronger…more determined to show them how wrong they were about you."

"I think you might be right," Christian mused, considering her words. "The more they pushed, the harder I fought. Perhaps my whole life has been a constant shout of 'so there!' at the two of them." She laughed, bringing out his grin again. "You were right, my Leslie Rose, we make some pair. The world had better watch out for us." She nodded, and he kissed her.


	9. Chapter 9

§ § § -- July 7, 2001

It was, at last, the day of Gabriella's coronation. The previous week or so had been a sheer whirlwind of preparations and telephone calls; most of it was a blur in Leslie's mind, but there were standout moments. The day after watching the tapes of the previous two coronations, Leslie, Anna-Laura, Anna-Kristina and Michiko had all embarked upon a shopping excursion together, and Michiko had finally asked a question that had been torturing Leslie's curiosity for years. "Is it just me," Michiko had asked, "or does royalty have a penchant for overusing the same names? You see, my sister and Errico's youngest brother are married and expecting a baby soon, and they plan to name it Androno if it's a boy, after Errico's late father. It turns out that there are quite a few Andronos in the Bartolomé ancestry, not to mention all the Erricos and Carlonos and Paolonos. And the females are almost as bad. I've always wanted to ask why, but I've been afraid of offending my husband if I did…so I thought perhaps you could shed some light on the question."

Anna-Laura had laughed aloud. "I've often thought of that myself," she said. "That's the reason I gave my children the names I did. Yes, we do have a bad habit of employing the same names again and again. Anna, in some form, is a favorite in the Enstad family. My mother's name was Susanna, which I sometimes think is the reason my father married her; and for about four generations there had been no girls born into the family. So when I was born, I received the name—though I'm told Mother insisted on adding the 'Laura' to help set me apart. Then when my brother Arnulf married his Kristina and they produced their first daughter, they decided to honor me and her in tandem, and thus combined the first half of my name with hers. That's why my niece here is named Anna-Kristina."

"What about the men?" Leslie had broken in then. "I see 'Carl' was used more than once…in the same generation, no less."

"Quite so," Anna-Laura had agreed. "In addition to the thirteen Eriks and six Lukases who have ruled this country, there were four Carls and five or six Johans. Our father, Arnulf I, was Grandfather Lukas' only child, and he disdained the idea of repeating names, which is why Father was the first Arnulf. But Father, being more staid and traditional than Grandfather, apparently lacked imagination and named his firstborn after himself; then we got my next brother, and he received the name Carl Johan Lukas Erik. I am Anna-Laura Charlotta. And then Christian came along…" She hesitated, met Leslie's look, and smiled wryly. "He has more reason than he knows to resent Father's attitude toward him. When we learned I had a third brother, Father cursed very loudly, then said, 'Just name him Carl, it's enough.' Mother and I were both quite angry about that. We already had a Carl Johan and needed something else to give the new baby his own identity. I had a favorite book whose hero was named Tobias, and said we should name the baby that. And Mother came up with the rest—she had a brother named Christian who died of polio at the age of fifteen months, and wanted to honor him. And that's why his name is Christian Carl Tobias."

Michiko had smiled and nodded, then given Leslie a look that Leslie knew she'd never forget and said, "Well, the Bartolomés are about to get quite the shock, because after all this time, I'm finally pregnant. And _this_ baby is going to get an original name!" Leslie had gawked at her, then shrieked with delight and hugged her best friend hard. It had never occurred to her to think about her own trouble conceiving; it always thrilled her to hear that one of her friends was expecting.

Three days later, Errico, Michiko and Carlono had come to join Anna-Kristina, Gabriella, Margareta, Christian and Leslie in Anna-Kristina's enormous double suite, on the back of the first floor next to the master suites that had been used by all the kings and queens of Lilla Jordsö for nearly a millennium. Here, they spent some serious time coming up with a list of songs that absolutely had to be played at the coronation gala. The yellow legal pad on which Margareta was writing down song titles began to fill in a surprising hurry, what with Michiko, Leslie, Carlono, Anna-Kristina and Gabriella throwing out a raft of suggestions that all dated from the 80s. Now and then Errico, treating the whole thing as a joke, had given them the title of some inane disco song from the late 70s, which usually made Leslie and Michiko carol about how well they remembered the tune in question.

Then Christian had cleared his throat. "Forgive me," he said, surveying the women especially; they had all been quite caught up in the fun. "But it appears that I'm the senior citizen of this group. Your Majesty, if I may ask, when were you born?"

Errico had laughed. "In 1961, my dear Prince Christian, which is the reason I've been suggesting those disco tunes. I frequented many a discothéque in my day."

"As I suspected," said Christian. "I'm three years older, so I am indeed the oldest one in the room. By the time the 80s came along, I had already passed the age of my greatest interest in the current music. This isn't to say that I disliked 80s music, but I came of age in a slightly earlier era. Leslie, my Rose, I know full well that you and Michiko, and quite likely Prince Carlono, should have some knowledge of 70s songs. Yet in all this time, neither you nor they have suggested a single tune from that decade. Why is that?"

Leslie, surprised, had stared at him. "It just never really crossed our minds, I suppose. Maybe also because the initial choices came from Anna-Kristina and Briella, and their memories revolve around most of the same 80s tunes we remember." She had then playfully rested her forearm on his shoulder and leaned on him. "If you wanted your era represented, then why didn't you make some suggestions?"

"Yeah, Uncle Christian!" chorused all three of Christian's nieces, then burst into a storm of giggling.

Christian gave Errico a long-suffering look; the Arcolosian monarch had shrugged and grinned. "I wasn't aware that anything I had to say would be welcome," Christian had said.

"Well, say something, my darling," Leslie said, grinning. "I'd love to hear it."

Christian had let his gaze roam around the group, resting for a few seconds on each face in turn; then, when he finally got around to his wife, he said, "Then let me see if I can stump you with a few oddities. Margareta, let me know if you need help spelling this. My favorite 70s song is 'The Logical Song' by Supertramp."

"I know that song!" exclaimed Leslie and Michiko in perfect unison, and at that the entire group had burst into laughter, Christian included. After that there had been a large number of 70s tunes suggested, until one point when Christian had made a quick trip up to his room and returned with a stack of old LPs that made the 60s-born contingent pounce on him to check out his collection.

And then—this, Leslie knew she would never forget either—Christian had casually said, "Oh, Margareta, here's an obscure one for you. This absolutely has to go on that list of yours. 'Easy Evil' by the Captain and Tennille."

Most of the others had stared blankly at him—but Michiko had looked around with wide-eyed interest, and Leslie had gasped aloud, sat up straight and gaped at him. "How do you know that song?" she had cried. "I love it!"

"I do too," Michiko had said. "In fact, I introduced Leslie to it, shortly after she and I first became friends! I thought no one outside the United States knew about that song."

Christian in his turn was gaping right back at Leslie. "You know that song too!?"

"Yes! Where did you hear about it?" Leslie had demanded excitedly.

"A dinner party when I was 21," Christian remembered, grinning. "We had the family of some visiting American politician, a mayor or some such, who had _jordisk_ ancestors. His one daughter was quite a fan and had brought a copy of the album that contains 'Easy Evil'. She played it for us, and the song truly impressed me. As a result, she gave me the album as a gift—and here it is." He displayed an LP at her. "And now that I know you're familiar with that song, you can rest assured that you and I are going to be dancing to it."

It had come out, later, that the coronation gala was not going to be held in the castle, but rather on the grounds of Liljefors Slott, thanks to some deft negotiations by Liselotta. Their own miniature fortress had a very nicely appointed ballroom of the sort that was curiously lacking in the royal castle, and they were more than happy to play hosts. The whole place had been in a state of anticipatory excitement, sorely needed after the heavily grievous atmosphere in the wake of Arnulf's death. Christian still had some mild episodes wherein he fought with his lingering guilt; but they had all been in private with only Leslie to witness them, and she had patiently talked him through them.

Now, on the seventh day of July, Leslie found herself awake for some reason; she cast a passing glance at the clock, which read a few minutes past six. She had called Roarke the night before to update him on the plans for the coronation, as well as to advise him on Christian's ongoing mental state and her news about Michiko's pregnancy. Christian had talked with him a little as well, enough to agree with both Roarke and Leslie that they had been in Lilla Jordsö long enough and should head for home as soon as Gabriella had been officially crowned—especially in light of Christian's looming man-without-a-country status. They wanted to get back to Fantasy Island before his current passport was rendered invalid and he found himself trapped in oceans of red tape. So they were planning to fly out of Sundborg around breakfast time on Sunday, the eighth, to reach Fantasy Island on what would in fact be Monday, the ninth, due to crossing the International Date Line again.

Leslie turned over in the bed to face Christian, who slept deeply at the moment, and regarded him with the usual sensation of curling excitement in her stomach. Every time she looked at him she thought her heart was too small to hold all the love she felt for him, and her emotions manifested themselves physically more often than not. He'd been through so much in this last week and a half; they both had been, but she knew the effects would linger with him for some time. Going back home might help to ease his remaining grief and the traces of guilt that stubbornly clung to it. They had so much to do to completely settle into their house, and she was impatient to start on it. She smiled to herself and closed her eyes, relaxing at Christian's side and listening to his quiet breathing. Eventually she fell asleep again, only to be slowly roused by someone's quiet voice in _jordiska_ nearby.

She soon grew aware that it was Christian on his cell phone, but had no idea whom he was talking to. She stirred a little and he stopped in the middle of something he was saying, then chuckled softly and wound up his conversation. Then she felt his hand on her, slowly stroking her back. "Wake up, my Rose," Christian murmured in a gentle singsong. "I promised you we're going to refresh all those lessons we taught you."

Leslie cracked open one bleary eye and peered at him. "Sadist."

Christian snickered and settled back down beside her, weaving his fingers in her hair and gently massaging her scalp with his fingertips. Leslie released a blissful little sigh and closed her open eye, more than ready to go back to sleep. "None of that, my darling," said Christian in amusement. "It's almost nine and only six hours before the ceremony."

"Wake me up at noon," mumbled Leslie drowsily. Christian laughed, and she added as an afterthought, "Who were you talking to a minute ago?"

"Hmm, so you were awake after all," Christian remarked. "I was checking on things at my office here. Jörgen has asked me to come in if I possibly can, and I think I can spare him an hour or so if I leave here by ten. Do you want to come with me?"

That made Leslie open her eyes again. "Well, I've never seen your office here, so I think I might do that. Where's it located?"

"South side of the city. I'll probably give Rudolf's car another run…we haven't stirred from the castle much since the funeral, and it's been sitting for a good while now. Anyway, I promised him I'd fill the gasoline tank in exchange for the sightseeing trip." He sat up and indulged in a stretch before sliding off the bed.

"How much is gas around here?" Leslie wondered idly, rolling onto her back and going through a long yawn and stretch of her own.

"Cheaper than in most of Europe, actually," Christian said from across the room where he was going through his suitcase. "That's because of the Vikslunds and their oil empire. Their drilling platforms are visible in the distance from the northern coast, and they are the source of all our fuel here. They make their real money selling to other countries." His voice dropped to a surprised mutter. "Now what happened to that suit jacket?"

"Which one?" Leslie asked, hopping off the bed in her turn. "I sent one down to the laundry on Anna-Kristina's advice."

"Oh," said Christian. "I suppose in that case I'll have to wear a different suit. You don't need to dress in anything fancy, just wear something comfortable. You'll be wearing formal dress long enough this afternoon. If we hurry, we can stop at a café I know and have breakfast there."

They dressed quickly—Christian in business attire (minus a suit jacket after all) and Leslie in one of her favorite sundresses—and crossed the great entry, already being set up for the ceremony, to the southern wing of the castle. "What're we doing here?" Leslie asked.

"The garages are on the foundation level on this side," Christian said. "I see no reason to have the car brought around when we're perfectly capable of going to get it. It just occurred to me that I'll have to get a Fantasy Island driver's license too. Just as well, mine for here is about to expire." He removed his wallet from a back pocket and idly took a look at his current license. "Hmm, well, I suppose it will have to be the first order of business when we get home. This expires the day we arrive."

Leslie laughed. "There's timing for you. Can I see?"

"You've never seen a driver's license?" Christian kidded, but handed it to her anyway. It dated from five years back; the photo of Christian on it was just this side of murderous, and Leslie tried with only partial success to choke back a laugh.

"Who were you thinking of skewering when they took that picture?" she asked.

"Arnulf," said Christian, half grinning, "who else? I was on Fantasy Island when my last license expired, and had to get it renewed immediately upon returning home—by which time, of course, I'd discovered I'd been married to Marina. Needless to say, I was in what felt like a permanently foul mood. I think this time the photo will be better." Leslie laughed and handed the license back to him.

In a few minutes they were on the way down the coastal road that led to the turnoff for the city. Familiar as he was with the highways and byways here, Christian drove fairly fast, but was an extremely competent driver; and Leslie relaxed and enjoyed the ride, watching the ocean vista roll by at their right, the green countryside flashing past all around them, the many trees dappling the sunlight. It took about fifteen minutes to get to the city limits, whereupon Christian took another route that skirted the downtown area and soon arrived at a small freestanding office building in a fairly heavily settled business district. Leslie had been watching him with fascination for the last several miles of the ride, and when he finally noticed her scrutiny, he paused just before killing the engine. "What?"

"Just watching you drive," she said and smiled. "You look so natural doing it."

"And you thought it was funny when I watched you drive that time," he said, shaking his head and laughing. "I've said it before, but you're still priceless. Well, come in with me and I'll introduce you to my staff here."

In short order Leslie met half a dozen people in Christian's employ, most notably his longtime office manager, Jörgen Olofsson, a smiling man around fifty or so, with a receding hairline and a brisk manner. Once the introductions had been performed, Jörgen said, "We do have a small problem that requires your attention, Your Highness…"

Christian gave Leslie an apologetic look. "You'll have to excuse us, my Rose," he said, "we need to use _jordiska_ for this. It looks to me as if Karla and Elisabeth over there want to ask you some questions." He grinned at two of his other employees, both of whom turned red at being caught out, but grinned back good-naturedly. "Go ahead and get acquainted. If we're lucky, this won't take very long." At her smile, he smoothed her hair once and then turned to Jörgen and asked him something in _jordiska_.

Leslie caught the eyes of Karla and Elisabeth and drifted in their direction, looking curiously around her as she did so. The office looked to be recently built, but there wasn't much for décor, and Leslie wondered if she should mention it to Christian. She grinned at the two women, who beamed back and invited her to sit with them. Leslie pulled up a chair in front of Elisabeth's desk and soon found herself answering excited questions about Fantasy Island, which she was more than happy to answer.

Then Karla said, "So now you are married to our Prince Christian! We always heard many things about you, but we never thought we would meet you. Is it really true, that soon he will no longer be a prince?"

"It's true," Leslie confirmed. "We were told it'll be maybe another two or three weeks, and then he'll be just another human being."

"I hope he has nice people working for him on Fantasy Island," Elisabeth said. "We always got along with him so well here, and we miss him. He's a very easy man to work for."

Leslie grinned. "That's how his Fantasy Island employees think of him too. I've known two of them personally since they were born—they're the younger brother and sister of a friend of mine—and they started calling him 'Boss Prince' when he finally came to the island and we got married. Christian got quite a laugh out of it." Karla and Elisabeth both laughed as well.

"Do you think he would fire us if we call him that?" Karla joked, bringing on more laughter. A couple of Christian's other employees, drawn by their banter, came to join them, and soon Leslie was very much at ease.

Some twenty minutes later Christian and Jörgen came over to investigate the lively conversation going on, and Leslie grinned at her husband's quizzical look. "This is such a nice group of people," she said. "You've got good folks working for you, my love."

"Yes, I do," Christian agreed, taking in his employees with a grin. "It's beginning to look like a party over here, and now that we've solved our little problem, I want to get in on it." Everyone laughed.

"But the coronation is today, isn't it?" Elisabeth asked. "The party tonight will be much bigger than anything we could hold. I heard it will be at Liljefors Slott."

"That it will," Christian confirmed, "thanks to my nephew's wife. They have the ballroom some forgetful ancestor of mine managed to omit at the castle. And now that you remind me, I'm afraid Leslie and I must get back there and start preparing."

Amid many goodbyes and well-wishes, Christian and Leslie got back on the road and stopped to fill Rudolf's gas tank before finding the café Christian had mentioned. Leslie was utterly stunned when they got there. "This is your café?" she exclaimed.

"Yes, why?" Christian asked.

"I've been here!" she told him, making his eyes go very wide. "The owners are the family of my friend Frida!" It was, indeed, Ebba's Café, owned by the Dannegård family, Frida's father and four half-siblings.

"I don't believe this," Christian said, staring at her. "When I lived here in the city, I used to eat here almost every morning before going to work. Now I _really_ don't understand how I ever missed meeting you when you were here before. We should have run into each other. How did we manage not to?"

"Timing, maybe," suggested Leslie. "I came in the late morning…you must have already been and gone when I got here."

"That must be it," Christian agreed incredulously, shaking his head. "I have to tell you, though, hearing about that makes me want to simply strangle Fate to death." Leslie let out a laugh, and they got out of the car and walked into the café hand in hand.

It was quiet inside, with only two or three tables occupied, and Leslie and Christian both instantly recognized the dark-haired man busing another table. At their entrance he looked up, then straightened in astonished delight. "Prince Christian…and Leslie Hamilton! Welcome back! It's been far too long!"

"It's good to see you again, Lukas," Christian said, shaking hands. "But you can't tell me you don't know that Leslie's my wife."

Lukas Dannegård grinned sheepishly. "I did know, but in my surprise I forgot. I well remember her previous visit here. She brought us back my half-sister. Hello, Princess."

Leslie groaned. "This 'princess' stuff just seems completely wrong for me," she said, giving Christian a plaintive look that made him laugh. "Lukas, I told you to call me Leslie when I was here the first time, and I wish you still would."

"Then I will, and many thanks," Lukas said. "Please, sit anywhere. Anything you like, it's on the house. Don't argue with me, Your Highness. It feels like a special occasion, and since I know you have moved to Fantasy Island, it may very well be. It was always a pleasure to have you come to us for breakfast."

"Oh, all right," Christian grumbled good-naturedly, "but under protest, you realize. Why don't we sit here in the back, my Rose. We could use a little privacy."

They had a very enjoyable meal there in the café and talked a bit with Lukas as well. He regularly heard from his father and Frida, and told them that while Kristofer and Catarina Dannegård were now living near their daughter in Sweden, they all came to Lilla Jordsö for annual summer vacations. "We expect them in August as usual," Lukas said. "Frida's little daughter is an angel and my sisters are simply crazy about her. And so, Your Highness—I understand that today we will have a new queen! It quite startled us when the news came out last year that Princess Anna-Kristina had given the succession to Princess Gabriella. Did she explain why?"

Christian and Leslie took turns telling him the story of Anna-Kristina's realization that she had no wish and no real inclination to be queen, and Lukas nodded understanding. "I wish Princess Gabriella all the best," he said. "Perhaps one day she will come here and I can give her and Prince Elias the same service I used to provide you. We truly have missed you around here, Prince Christian. I am very happy you came back."

On their way back to the castle, Leslie grinned impishly at Christian. "The People's Prince," she said cheerfully. "Everyone I've met this morning seems to be crazy about you. Are you sure you want to give up your title?"

"I've had enough of life in a fishbowl," Christian said dismissively, grinning back. "I'd much rather be just Christian Enstad. Frankly, I can hardly wait to go home."

"Same here," Leslie agreed, squeezing his hand. "It's been a very interesting interlude, but it's time for us to get back."


	10. Chapter 10

§ § § -- July 7, 2001

After a very light lunch, the royal family scattered to their various suites to prepare for the ceremony. Leslie, who had found herself the owner of six complete new outfits on the shopping trip she had taken with Michiko, Anna-Laura and Anna-Kristina, surveyed the two formal gowns they had helped her choose and wondered with the first traces of unease what the other women would be wearing. Christian, meantime, went to one of the large wooden armoires for the first time since they'd taken over this room and opened it to survey the contents. Happy to let herself be distracted, Leslie joined him there. "So that's where the white dress uniform got off to," she remarked. "Are you going to bring it back home with you?"

"Maybe," Christian said. "I should probably wear that today, as a matter of fact. This is one of those times I'm happy I was born male. I really think you women fuss too much over clothing. Have you made a choice yet?"

"No…I'm afraid of standing out too much," Leslie admitted. "Please, my love, help me, will you? I just don't know what I'm doing here."

"My poor Rose, out of her element again," Christian said teasingly. "All right, then, let's get a look. We never got around to having you model whatever you bought the other day, so I'm looking forward to this." Extracting the white dress uniform from the armoire and closing the doors, he followed her to the bed and examined the two dresses that had been laid out there. "You know, I think this will be as difficult for me as for you." One of the gowns was a rich emerald green silk, with a round neck and a square scalloped collar that draped over the shoulders and upper arms, and was trimmed in matching satin at the edge of the scalloping and along the hem. The slim green belt was genuine leather. The second dress—silk again—was pure white, elegant in its simplicity with long gathered sleeves and a V-neck that would just accommodate Leslie's necklace. Only its belt was a standout: an inch-wide strip of white silk liberally shot through with silver threads, to be tied in a loose knot around the waist.

"I was kind of leaning toward the white one," Leslie admitted after a moment of silence. "If you wear your white uniform, we'd look…well, like a matched set."

"Like we belong together, you mean," Christian said gently and kissed her. "Which we do. Yes, definitely, wear that. And I am already in a great state of anticipation to see you in it." He grinned, winked at her and swept his uniform off the bed to change in the bathroom, so that Leslie could don her gown in private and give him the element of surprise.

Fifteen minutes later, completely ready, he emerged and stopped short in his tracks, staring. Leslie had yet to put on the makeup she knew she would need, but she was fully dressed otherwise and brushing her hair. The dress was a perfect fit: Anna-Kristina had firmly insisted that all alterations on her new clothing be done while they waited, and the effect was stunning. Mesmerized, Christian drifted toward her and surveyed her from head to toe. "So beautiful," he breathed.

Leslie looked at him with nervous eyes. "Then you like it," she ventured.

"You do have a knack for understatement at the oddest times," Christian observed with a wry smile. "It's perfect. Anna-Kristina tells me she has brought the makeup artist back out from the city, so you need not worry about that. We're going down to her rooms for that. Are you ready otherwise?"

"As much as I can ever be, considering what's about to happen," Leslie said. "I never in my wildest dreams thought I'd be in a position like this, and I'm scared stupid."

Christian grinned at the phrase and gently removed the hairbrush from her hand, dropping it into her suitcase. "You have me," he reminded her simply. "Let's go now."

Together they walked down to Anna-Kristina's suite; the princess' eyes popped and her mouth fell open in wonder. "You look perfect together!" she cried. "I think the cameras will be watching you instead of Briella, and that will make her simply furious."

Christian and Leslie both laughed and slipped into the room. "So why haven't you finished dressing yet, _Kattersprinsessan?"_ Christian inquired humorously. "You're going to make us late—if Briella grows furious over something, it will be that, not us."

"But I have nothing to wear!" Anna-Kristina cried, then stared at her uncle with a wounded expression: Christian had said the exact same thing in tandem with her, imitating her almost perfectly and sending Leslie into a fit of laughter. "Uncle Christian…!"

"If you had nothing to wear, you should have bought something when you and your aunt and Queen Michiko took Leslie shopping," Christian said. "Honestly, Anna-Kristina, you can't tell me that there's nothing in that closet full of clothes you have—not and make me believe it. You own half the clothing that's ever been manufactured in this country to begin with. How can there be nothing suitable?"

"He doesn't understand, Aunt Leslie," Anna-Kristina protested, giving Leslie a pleading look. "He's a man, and they never understand."

Leslie giggled. "Don't panic just yet. Maybe I can help you find something. Let's see what you've got."

"Don't faint from shock, my darling," Christian said dryly, finding a chair and making himself comfortable so that he could watch. He returned the grin Leslie cast him over her shoulder and looked on with great interest.

Anna-Kristina led Leslie over to the far wall; her enormous bed, covered by a turquoise satin comforter and piled high with throw pillows in every possible tint of turquoise, bisected the space, and on either side the wall seemed to consist entirely of closets set off with louvered shutters. Anna-Kristina went to the left-hand one and pushed aside the shutters on both ends, leaving Leslie gaping at the sheer accumulation of clothes hanging therein. Anna-Kristina, giving the contents little more than a cursory glance, swept a hand through the air and wailed, "You see? Nothing!"

"That's an awful lot of nothing," Leslie remarked, at which Christian hooted with mirth from his chair. "Come on, Anna-Kristina, I'm sure there's something here. Where do you keep the outfits that are suitable for formal occasions?"

The princess sighed melodramatically and plowed into the closet, using her entire body to shove about three-quarters of the clothes farther towards the end near the bed. This left some twenty or so dresses hanging there. "Okay," Leslie said, "that's still quite a bit of nothing. What's wrong with all these?"

"I've worn them all before," said Anna-Kristina. They heard Christian groan.

Leslie shrugged. "Most people wear their clothes more than once," she said gently.

"But I'm a princess," Anna-Kristina said impatiently.

"Maybe that's the whole problem," remarked Christian, and in spite of herself Leslie snickered. Anna-Kristina threw him a quelling look that just made him laugh again.

Leslie went to the closet and patiently removed one dress after the next, scrutinizing each with a critical eye. After the first few, which seemed a little flashy, she turned to face Christian with the fifth one. "What do you think, my love?"

Christian studied it, then said, "No, I don't think so. The color is too bright." It was a deep-blue dress with a calf-length skirt. "Actually, my Rose, you can eliminate anything without a floor-length skirt. That should narrow it down slightly."

"How slightly?" Leslie wondered, making Christian laugh again. She grinned, hung up the blue dress and went through some of the next few till she found one with a full skirt. It was in a pale pink and edged with metallic fabric in the same color. "What about this?"

"I wore that at the last formal function," Anna-Kristina protested.

"Which was when?" interjected Christian.

"February," she said.

Christian and Leslie looked at each other. "Is she for real?" Leslie wondered.

To her surprise, Christian nodded. "For royalty, that _is_ a little too recent," he agreed. "Try again. I know she's got to have something."

"You're both starting to worry me," Leslie said only half jokingly, returning the pink dress to the closet and eliminating three more. The next one was in a somewhat deeper pink, unadorned, with a scoop-neck collar and short cap sleeves. "Hmm…"

"Not formal enough," decreed Christian.

Leslie shot him a startled look. "Now who's the clotheshorse?" she said, and Christian rolled his eyes.

"I suppose that's your way of telling me to shut up?" he suggested.

"Yup. Butt out, my love, and I mean that in the nicest possible way," Leslie assured him, amused. "I'll ask for your input if I need it, though." She put the dress back and went through some more till she got to the last: a gauzy pale-lemon-colored chiffon that seemed to float through the air as Leslie pulled it out. "Hmm. How about this?"

"Oh, I still have the shoes that go with that," Anna-Kristina exclaimed excitedly. "And I haven't worn it in almost a year. Maybe that will be right."

"It looks good from here," Christian said hopefully.

Leslie grinned and handed Anna-Kristina the dress. "Then go put it on, and let's see how you look. Try to be quick, okay?" Anna-Kristina nodded and shot off across the room to the other half of her suite. Christian slumped in his chair and let out a loud groan.

"Now do you see what I mean? I honestly believe that if I were ever to sneak into this room and take out fifty percent of these clothes to give to charity, she would never miss them. After all, she constantly disdains them as 'nothing'. And after what I see on this side of the closet, I hate to ask what lurks on the other side that didn't even merit consideration. What are you doing, then?" Leslie had come over to him as he spoke and now stood with a foot on either side of his long legs, which he'd stretched out in front of him.

She grinned and leaned over to him, bracing herself with a hand on each of the chair arms, her eyes sparkling. "After all this complaining, Christian, my love, you'd better think twice before you give me clothes on either my birthday or Christmas."

Christian's grunt told her what he thought of that. "A wise man never buys clothes for a woman, unless he happens to have a death wish. Never fear about that. Frankly, I'm glad you were here to defuse the next bomb. I haven't seen her with Prince Carlono yet, and to tell the truth, I wonder if he knows about this side of her."

Leslie lowered her head and kissed him. "Then ask her. And maybe you should sit up straight. You're the first slouching prince I've ever met."

"I have a right to slouch if I like," Christian said with heated dignity, and she giggled. He grinned back and obediently sat up, then pulled her down onto his lap, evoking a soft surprised squeal from her before she landed, giggling again. "However, you may have a point there…this is really much nicer." He kissed her, and when Anna-Kristina came out they were involved enough not to notice her reappearance.

The princess watched for a moment, cleared her throat, and rolled her eyes when it went ignored. Loudly she demanded, "Do you two ever take your hands off each other?"

Christian broke from Leslie long enough to assure her dreamily, "Never," and then resumed kissing his wife. Anna-Kristina snickered, envious in spite of herself, and crossed the room to hunt for the shoes that matched her dress.

Only the knock on the door a few minutes later made Christian finally stop kissing Leslie and give her a rueful look. "Thought I'd better do that now…I don't know when I'll have my next chance," he said, making her grin and drop a last quick kiss on his lips while Anna-Kristina opened the door and admitted the other Enstad women, including Gabriella. Anna-Laura and Amalia, seeing Leslie still in Christian's lap, looked at each other.

"I see Christian and Leslie are making the best use of the seating in here, since all the other chairs are clearly occupied," Anna-Laura remarked acerbically, surveying the several empty chairs scattered around the room.

"As I told Leslie the other day, Father and Arnulf should have taken some of that energy they expended on marrying me off and used it on finding you a husband," Christian told his sister with a good-natured grin. "I really think you're jealous sometimes."

"Of course I'm jealous," retorted Anna-Laura. "Unfortunately, it's not easy for a princess to meet a suitable man, particularly if she's staring her fiftieth birthday in the face. I wonder, Leslie, if royalty is entitled to fantasies."

Leslie grinned. "Of course," she said. "We've had our share of princes and princesses come to us looking for a fantasy. Father and I'd be glad to help you."

Anna-Laura regarded her with real interest and said thoughtfully, "Then I'll keep that in mind. However, just now we have some work to do. Anna-Kristina, where is that makeup artist? I thought you said she would be here by now."

"Quite likely cooling her heels in the great entry," Christian said. "Since I appear to be the only male in the room, let me correct that problem and go after her for you." Liselotta said something, and everyone laughed; Christian tossed her a salute and departed.

Amalia saw Leslie's curious look and said with a broad smile, "Liselotta asked him if he would bring Gerhard back with him," she explained, and Leslie grinned. "Oh, Leslie, you look truly lovely in that dress. You'll be perfect beside Christian, and you'll do the family much credit."

"Thank you, Amalia," Leslie said self-consciously, "but if I were you I wouldn't be so quick to speak. Christian promised me this morning we'd go over all those lessons in protocol that everyone tried to pound into my head this past week."

"Oh yes," Anna-Laura exclaimed. "While we wait for Christian to bring back the makeup woman—and maybe Gerhard—" that brought on more laughter— "we'll do a hasty run-through or two. Now, everyone line up as you will for the initial procession…"

At five minutes till three the entire royal family waited in the corridor from which they would emerge into the great entry. Gabriella, with Elias by her side, was in the lead; behind her was Kristina, and Anna-Kristina and Margareta stood behind her. Carl Johan and Amalia were next with Gerhard and Liselotta behind them, then Rudolf standing alone; then Anna-Laura with Roald as escort, and Cecilia and Axel behind; and at the very end of the line, Christian and Leslie. They all stood in silence, aware of the incredibly solemn event about to take place, all looking straight ahead and carefully composing themselves. Christian noticed Leslie start to breathe a little deeply and swallow; he turned to her with a slight smile and murmured, "You'll be fine, my darling. You really only need remember that you must stand still and straight-faced beside me, without actually touching me, your eyes on Elias and Briella the entire time."

Leslie looked at him, faintly panicky. "But you and I have to be first in line to make obeisance," she said. "We can't touch then either?"

Christian shook his head. "If you're truly so worried, remember that I'm at your side, not behind you, and you can watch me in case you miss any cues. You know the proper curtsy, right?" She nodded. "Good. As I said, it should be fifteen minutes at most." He paused, took in her attempt to compose herself, and then relented long enough to place a feathery kiss on her cheek. "That's the last time I can touch you until the ceremony is over, so that will have to be enough for you till then," he teased gently.

"Are they taping this?" she whispered frantically.

He grinned. "Of course they are, silly girl! If you're so anxious, I'll tell Carl Johan to send us a copy of it when it's ready." She threw him a dirty look and he chuckled. At that moment a fanfare swelled up in the great entry, and he glanced over the heads of the others in front of them. "You're going to be fine, my Rose. Here we go."

It wasn't hard for Leslie to remain sober-faced; she was too nervous to find any humor in the situation. She wanted desperately to look at Christian, but resolutely kept her eyes trained straight ahead as she walked by his side in the family's wake. Inanely she wondered what announcers around the world were saying at this moment, while all this was being telecast on countless TV screens, and then gave some thought to all her friends and Roarke on Fantasy Island, where it was currently three in the morning. Tabitha might be gung-ho enough to be awake at this hour, but it was unlikely the others were, even Roarke.

The formal fanfare continued as Elias and Gabriella moved to the center of the dais and the rest of the family filed onto the top tier, forming a semicircle around them, with Christian and Leslie on the end. He had told her there would be a formal announcement, made by the head of the _jordiska_ parliament, that Gabriella would now be crowned; then long, serious oaths were to be taken, consisting in the main of a reminder of the many duties, responsibilities, rights and powers the monarch held and how to administer them in the course of ruling the country. Once the crown was placed atop Gabriella's head, the parliamentary head and the page bearing the crown would make the first obeisance to the new queen, followed immediately by the royal family. So Leslie knew to watch for this last and take it as the cue to step off the dais: having walked in at Christian's right, she now stood right on the edge of the top tier and would have to step off it even before Christian did, so that he could fall into step beside her and the others could follow them.

Just before the parliamentary head came forward to speak, she swept a quick glance around the family circle, moving only her eyes. Sure enough, they all stood looking on without expression, hands at sides and no one touching anyone else. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Christian matching their looks and stances, and promptly returned her gaze to the front, just in time. She hoped she looked dignified enough not to disgrace her husband and his family, for they had been correct—the protocol was indeed quite brutal. It even went down to posture. Not only did she have to be still and silent, with a blank face, but she was also required to stand straight, at her full five-feet-nine, with her weight evenly distributed between both feet. Hands could not be clasped in front or behind, but must hang straight down. It crossed Leslie's mind to hope she didn't develop an itch somewhere, and she instantly squashed it lest the idea bring on the reality.

Since she couldn't understand the long speeches and oaths in _jordiska_, she found it somewhat difficult to concentrate on the ceremony and had to fight to keep her mind from drifting in every possible direction. She lost her sense of time, and she began to grow aware of a dull fatigue from holding her straightened position. Each time Gabriella spoke—presumably taking another oath—she wondered how many more there were remaining. The astounding quiet in the great entry made her aware of every extraneous sound; when someone in the audience coughed, it startled her almost enough to twitch—another taboo. She wished she knew what was going through Christian's mind right then. Was he still as rebellious, at least mentally, as he had been back in 1995 at his brother's coronation? Was he having irreverent thoughts? Was his mind shooting off all over the place like hers? Leslie became aware that she was losing focus and tried to gather her concentration. She thought, _Oh no, what if I sneeze?_ and then roundly scolded herself for thinking that too.

Incredibly, beside her, Christian suddenly did sneeze, and she blinked, only barely managing not to look at him in her astonishment. _Me and my big mouth. Or my big head,_ Leslie thought with a trace of hysteria, trying to convince herself that her thought hadn't brought about the deed. Christian simply recomposed himself without bringing any further attention to the slight interruption, somewhat to her disappointment; no one else moved at all, and the speeches and oaths continued as if nothing had happened. But after a few seconds, she realized that Christian's breathing had become slightly irregular, and had to concentrate very carefully on her own to remain under control: for she knew immediately that he was trying his utmost not to laugh!

It took him a moment to settle down, and it looked as if no one noticed. Leslie took in a very slow, deep breath, let it out just as slowly, and surreptitiously wiggled her toes in her shoes. Christian's unexpected sneeze had made her feel inexplicably more relaxed; it was as if she'd been reassured that she wasn't the only one who could make an inadvertent mistake. She hoped Arnulf I had taken such involuntary instances into account when he rewrote the protocol in 1962; she'd have to ask Christian when this finally ended.

Another minute or so ticked away; then the parliamentary head lifted the crown off its pillow and placed it atop Gabriella's head with great care. He then turned to the assembled crowd and in _jordiska_ formally announced that the country had its new monarch, at which point he and the page dropped to their knees and lowered their heads. Prince Elias promptly followed suit, and Leslie took her cue, turning and moving down. Christian drew up beside her, and side by side they stepped off the lowermost tier, moved to the center, then back up to the middle tier. The second Christian started to sink, she did the same, calling on leg muscles to keep her upright and steady as she knelt nearly to the floor, without actually touching it as Christian was doing. He held his kneel-and-bow and she her curtsy till Gabriella touched each of their shoulders and smiled, and they arose and moved off to the right in single file, out of sight of the cameras for a moment or two and at the right of the dais where the family would gather and remain while Gabriella received their many guests' acknowledgments of her new position.

As soon as they got out of the range of the TV cameras, Christian slipped an arm around Leslie, and she let out her breath with a loud, relieved groan. "Oh, my God!"

He grinned at her. "You're all right?" he asked. "You did very well, my Rose."

Leslie shrugged. "Was that sneeze a breach of protocol?" she wanted to know.

Christian's eyes lit with merriment. "You're actually serious, aren't you! No, it was one of those things you just can't help. But even if it were, quite frankly, I have to admit it wouldn't bother me in the slightest. My father's rules are too damned strict, and I've been hoping Briella will find the time to rewrite them."

"Thank the fates," Leslie muttered with another sigh, this one a bit shaky.

"Why?" Christian asked in surprise.

She found herself grinning sheepishly at him. "Because just beforehand, I wondered what would happen if _I_ should sneeze, and when you did, I stood there thinking I'd made you do it." Christian blinked and then burst out laughing, the sound carrying over the rising voices in the great entry and setting off her own relieved laughter.

The rest of the family began joining them, and Anna-Laura eyed Christian with mock reproach, shaking her head. "I should have known you'd find a way to call attention to yourself, Christian Carl Tobias," she said. "Sneezing like that!"

"Father forgot to forbid sneezing," Christian said innocently, touching off an explosion of laughter in everyone, including Liselotta after Gerhard translated for her. Laughing, he hugged Leslie close and said cheerfully to her, "I'm still incorrigible, aren't I?"

"Absolutely," she agreed, smiling. "My very own incorrigible prince." They kissed softly for several seconds before cuddling up to each other and waiting patiently for the chance to retreat to the family's living quarters.


	11. Chapter 11

§ § § -- July 7, 2001

The gala, by the time the Enstad family arrived, was already in progress, booming with light and sound, teeming with people. Christian, dressed in black slacks and a casual white silk shirt with the sleeves rolled up past his elbows, found it very hard to keep his eyes off Leslie. She was wearing another of the new dresses from the shopping trip—a short-sleeved, black sequined number whose hem stopped only halfway to her knees. She still wore the ruby heart necklace, but had also donned the rainbow-gem bracelet she wore most weekends while working; and there'd been a very enjoyable session in Anna-Kristina's suite during which the new queen, her two sisters and her aunts Anna-Laura and Amalia had played around with her hair for a long time before leaving it loose, but catching it up behind her ears on each side with a pair of hair clips adorned with black silk roses.

"I won't let anyone else dance with you all night," Christian said, an arm possessively around her waist, as they came into Liljefors Slott's ballroom with the rest of the family. "If you only knew the effect you have on me in that dress, Leslie Enstad…"

"And you think I want you dancing with another woman?" she retorted warmly, smiling up at him. "Did I ever tell you I saw you dancing with some strange woman at Gerhard and Liselotta's wedding reception? You should have seen how green I was."

"Oh, you were jealous?" asked Christian with a smug grin.

"You bet I was," Leslie said. "Who was she, anyway?"

"Some senator's wife," Christian said, shrugging. "Someone told me her name, but I immediately forgot it. I stopped dancing after that because she stepped on my feet at least twenty-five times throughout the dance, and they were too sore to go on." Leslie laughed aloud, and he grinned back and guided her along to an empty table near the platform that had been set up for the disk jockey. They took chairs and turned them around so as to face the massive dance floor; the DJ had yet to arrive, but staff were already making rounds, serving drinks and taking dinner orders.

Almost half an hour passed before the DJ showed up, by which time all the attendees had arrived; Errico and Michiko had appeared a scant few minutes after Christian and Leslie had claimed their table, and had joined them there, so that now there was a lively conversation in progress. During a brief lull, Christian happened to look around and noticed Margareta inside the DJ booth, handing the platter jockey the two-page list of song requests that she, her sisters, Errico, Michiko, Christian and Leslie had come up with. He brought the others' attention to this, just in time to catch the startled look the DJ gave Margareta. All four broke into laughter.

"What time are they serving dinner?" Michiko asked.

"I'm told it should be around seven," said Christian. It was almost six now. "I can't say I'm especially hungry, though. Too many nerve-racking events went on today, and I'm still recovering from that ceremony. My father and his accursed rules."

Michiko remarked, "I think we were relieved when you sneezed. Errico looked at me when that happened and said he was glad for the human touch. Gracious, how incredibly solemn you all looked up there!"

"It's very rigid, yes," Christian said. "We had to drill poor Leslie in all the intricate little requirements. For having had a crash course, she did beautifully."

"Yeah, well, it's a wonder I wasn't the one who sneezed," Leslie remarked, and they all laughed again. Their chatting continued for a few more minutes; then the DJ made a few remarks over the loudspeakers, and the party was on in earnest.

It took him almost half an hour to get around to tackling Margareta's list, and when he did, for some time there was a long string of 80s tunes, including Toto's "Africa", two or three Duran Duran songs, and the début hit from a Norwegian band called Midnight Sun, a tune entitled "Tell It Straight" from 1986. Christian was highly entertained by Leslie's story of having met them once when they'd played Fantasy Island's amusement park. The two of them were on the dance floor for quite a lot of these songs, and when the DJ announced a break after nearly finishing off the first page of the list, they were relieved to sit down and rest a bit. Michiko and Errico rejoined them a few seconds later.

"Shall we eat?" Errico questioned, looking at his wife. _"Cari mie,_ you are eating for two, so I think it best that you have something at least."

Christian looked around at them in surprise. "You're expecting? When are you due?"

"Roughly mid-December," Michiko said. "Sometimes I'm surprised it took me so long, and other times I'm surprised I got pregnant at all. Errico and I have been married for almost ten years."

"Either way, congratulations are in order," Christian said, shaking Errico's hand and smiling at Michiko. "Are you hoping for a particular gender?"

"A girl," Michiko said, exchanging a merry glance with Leslie. "Our daughter Adriana has pestered me almost ever since our marriage for a little sister."

"I'll keep my fingers crossed that you get one," Leslie promised. "You've got to keep us all updated, you know. The other girls'll be thrilled to hear that news."

They all decided to have a scaled-down meal, and the dinner conversation ran to a large assortment of topics; by the time they were finished, everyone's energy was back up and they were ready for the next round of dancing. The very next song to be played was a choice Leslie had made in honor of Gabriella—ABBA's "Dancing Queen", with which she sang along while she and Christian were out on the floor. Once it was over, he gave her a surprised look and said, "You sing better than I thought."

"I hope that's a compliment, Christian Enstad," she said in mock warning, and he laughed and assured her that it was.

Another half-dozen songs went by before Christian's first choice came up—"The Logical Song", with which he in turn sang, surprising Leslie. It was the first time she'd seen or heard him do so, and while he readily admitted to being no professional, he could carry a tune enough to be tolerable. There was an ironic quality to his voice as he sang the lines, which Leslie understood when she listened to the words. _"…And they showed me a world where I could be so dependable, clinical, intellectual, cynical… …Now watch what you say or they'll be calling you a radical, liberal, fanatical, criminal…"_

"They did that to you, your father and brother," she said knowingly during the song's instrumental bridge.

"I always considered this my private little theme," Christian agreed. "It seemed to express my frustration quite nicely." He dropped a kiss on her forehead and took up the chorus when it kicked in; this time Leslie joined him, though she had a hard time not laughing when he struggled to reach the higher notes that concluded it. At the whimsical little whistle that immediately followed the last word, he rolled his eyes with perfect timing, which did make her break into laughter. Christian joined in and hugged her close, still rocking in time with the song. "So are you having fun?"

"It's a blast," said Leslie happily. "I don't even mind dancing." Christian's laugh this time was quite hearty; she smirked back at him.

Three songs later the lights dimmed and the low, sultry introductory notes reverberated out of the speakers; Christian and Leslie looked at each other with anticipatory recognition and drew in close for slow swaying in time with the languid beat of "Easy Evil." With a particular look, Leslie deliberately started singing along, making Christian stare at her in amazement just for a moment. She seemed caught up in the sensual spirit of the tune, and it took little effort for her to catch him in the suggestive excitement as she sang.

_You're such an easy evil  
__You're such a promise of fun  
__Sometimes I don't know what I'm doing till I'm done  
__You're a sneaky one…_

Christian couldn't seem to take his eyes off her after that, watching her as she sang up to him, eyes at half mast, head tipped back, a small, knowing smile on her lips. Toni Tennille's smoky vocals lent the perfect atmosphere to the song, shutting Christian and Leslie off in their own private orbit, where they unknowingly drew the attention of other nearby dancers—most of them either envious or wistful to some degree of the amazing connection these two clearly had with each other.

Then Christian surprised her completely when he took over a second voice that half sang, half spoke through a voice-box device during the bridge, just as suggestive as his wife had been. She gazed at him in fascination, watching the gleam in his eyes.

_You're such an easy evil, I know you are  
__But boy, you ought to see what I am  
__I am the most unbelievable in the whole wide world…_

When the words degenerated into murmurings, Christian abandoned the effort and kissed her, right out there on the dance floor, still moving slowly with her in his arms. It was a tease, a promise of things ahead, and seemed to ratchet up the temperature between them. Just before the vocals returned, Leslie let her head tip back again, falling away from him, smiling knowingly.

_Here he comes now, touching me, calling my name  
__Again…  
__Here I go now, like a moth to a flame  
__I'm a sucker for you, baby_

The last line made Christian smile back, a trace of smugness about him—they both knew the truth of this. She still sang softly along with the words till the song slowly faded out; they had to stand there for a good fifteen seconds regaining their composure while a fast song shattered the mood and people bopped energetically around them.

Then Christian blew out his breath and led her off the floor, dodging dancers here and there. Collapsing heavily into his chair, he looked at her with wonder. "You simply astound me," he admitted. "You realize, of course, that now I'm going to have to seduce you with that song. I was much too close to losing control…"

Leslie rested her elbow on the table and propped her chin atop her fist, giving him another of those suggestive smiles, though with restraint this time. "When we get home, to our own house, and it's dark and we hear the sound of the ocean washing onto the sand…that's the perfect time and place. I'll hold you to it."

"It's a date," Christian said and smiled back.

§ § § -- July 9, 2001 – Fantasy Island

It was late afternoon when the charter plane landed just off the coast of Fantasy Island; the gentle bump of the pontoons hitting the water woke its two exhausted passengers, who looked around with sleepy confusion at first. "Oh," Leslie murmured with great relief when she realized what had happened. "We're home."

"At last," Christian sighed and yawned hugely. "I think I could sleep for an entire week. Do you suppose Mr. Roarke is going to want us to stay for dinner?"

"Probably, but I don't think it'll kill us," Leslie said, patting his arm. "Besides, my stomach is empty, and you know Mariki's going to consider it her personal mission in life to fill us up till we explode."

Christian snorted tolerantly. "Does she still think you have anorexia?"

"Yes," Leslie said with a groan, and he grinned. They joined hands and watched the scenery slide past them while the plane taxied into the lagoon and finally moored to the dock; then they got to their feet and disembarked, so tired that they both staggered slightly on their feet as they stepped onto home turf. Then Leslie looked up and brightened: at the edge of the clearing stood Roarke, waiting for them, smiling broadly.

"Hi, Father!" she called out, making Christian look up with a grin of his own. He let her loose as she broke away and ran across the clearing to hug Roarke, and caught up with her just as they let go.

"Welcome home, both of you," Roarke said with feeling, squeezing his daughter a last time and grasping his son-in-law's hands. "I can see you're worn out, but if you don't mind indulging me long enough to have dinner, I'd be very interested in hearing about your trip and all the events that took place there. Christian, you in particular must have had quite the sense of displacement, what with the great upheavals you've just endured."

Christian smiled ruefully as they started for the car, Leslie in between him and Roarke with an arm linked with each. "It seems as if we were gone longer than two weeks," he said. "Just before Leslie and I left for the airport, I warned Gabriella that she'd better live to be at least a hundred, for I have no wish to go through another coronation in my lifetime."

Roarke laughed. "Completely understandable. Well, shall we?"

He drove them back to the main house, leaving their luggage in the car for the time being and urging them to take their seats at the table on the veranda before going back to the kitchen to notify Mariki that Christian and Leslie had returned. Mariki, as always, made an overblown fuss over both of them, served more food than they could eat, and then left them to their meal. Roarke let them take the edge off their hunger before giving Christian a compassionate look and asking gently, "Are you quite all right?"

Christian sat quietly for a moment, contemplating Roarke's question, and smiled at Leslie when she laid her hand on his arm in silent support. Finally he looked at Roarke and said, "I think it's only fair that I give you an honest answer, Mr. Roarke. I'm not really back to normal, not yet, and it's going to take me some time to get there. Leslie pulled me through the worst of my grief and the attendant guilt, but now and then I still find myself wondering if I didn't really deserve some sort of retaliation for my thoughts."

Roarke regarded him for a moment or two. "When you find yourself falling into that trap," he said, "it may help you to remember this. The world is filled with coincidence, both comic and tragic; and too often we find ourselves visited by it, sometimes to the point that it amazes us. You were affected by tragic coincidence: your thoughts, followed by the passing of your brother. But it was not possible for you to know what would happen." He sat back. "Leslie told me how she brought you back from the edge of madness, and though I didn't tell her this at the time, I found myself thinking that perhaps she learned something from me after all." This came with a teasing smile at his daughter, who rolled her eyes and grinned at him. "The things she said to you, Christian, are very much the words I myself would have chosen in her place. Keep them in mind in those darker moments, and remind yourself of their truth: they are your absolution, and you deserve the peace they will give you. And don't forget, Leslie is there as well."

Christian looked up with tears standing in his eyes. "My absolution," he repeated softly, a look of hope dawning on his face. "Perhaps I did in fact receive the absolution I've been searching for. It was something Leslie's been trying to tell me for days, and now I think I finally understand. Thank you, Mr. Roarke."

"You're always welcome," Roarke replied, then smiled. "Once again, welcome home, both of you. And please, finish eating so that Mariki has one less excuse to nag." Through a burst of laughter, Christian and Leslie nodded and squeezed hands.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

_The lyrics quoted above come from the following sources:  
_"_The Logical Song", words and music © 1979 by Rick Davies and Roger Hodgson  
_"_Easy Evil", words and music © 1971 by Alan O'Day_

_As always, your thoughts and comments are welcomed and highly appreciated. There's loads more down the road…stay tuned…_


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